Bad host behaviour damaging Airbnb

[Tobias21]

Hi,

I am a host and a traveller with Airbnb since 2014.

I have hosted over 25 guests and am proud to have an excellent service record.

Recently, after a long search, I booked a trip to Sicily.

The place looked great - and after our booking was accepted, I let my in-laws and friends know that my family and I would be staying there over the summer. They had started to look and make similar plans when, two weeks later, the host for the property contacted us to let us know that the property was actually not available, and asked us - rather rudely - to cancel the reservation.

When I asked the host to cancel, he refused, explaining that it would be free for us to cancel, and that otherwise our money would not be refunded.

I felt this was unfair, but after a long search I realised that Airbnb places a financial penaly on hosts for cancelling (which is logical), but does not offer guests any kind of indemnity for host cancellation. What's more, there was no way for me to contact Airbnb to inform them of poor host behaviour. Airbnb must not care how hosts behave, and even wants to protect bad hosts from having a bad reputation visible to travellers!

As a host within the community, I find this depressing.

I am proud to be an independent house owner and host, and value having guests who take attention in how they interact with hosts and their properties.

In order to secure growth of its own revenues and profits, Airbnb has included large agencies (like the one I recently had to cancel with) who behave badly, and has cut down on customer support. Over time, these bad hosts will give Airbnb a bad name, drive lower prices and attract customers who expect nothing more than cheap accomodation, and become used to poor standards.

I would like to know if other hosts/travellers have had similar experiences, and if you (anyone out there?) have noticed similar closure of channels of communication with Airbnb?

Of course, if Airbnb is reading this, I invite you to contact me and let me know what you are doing about this issue - or indeed if this clearly defined corporate strategy is going to be "reviewed" to return to the older, more transparent and well supported system.

Thanks community.

[Adel14]

During our present holiday, myself and my wife, An Australian couple, have had four fanatastic experiences through over Europe , and all our reviews proved our great thanks about it, however, we had a terrible experience on Rome, Italy ** owned by A very greedy and rude woman called Silvia I do believe that such this person may spoil the reputation of the Airbnb experiences in both the place that she rent it and in her behaviour.

considering her place:

1-it is dirty and full of insects

2- no light and no ventellation at all

3-sheets, pillows and towels are disgusting any person can’t even dare to toutch 

4 the photos of the place deseive  any person as she took them when she was laying on the floor!

5- as a whole l can imagine the place that she call it as an apartment seems as a hole of rates to hide

6-what she calls it as a kitchen is 1mx1m containing dirty tools most probably collected from some garbage place, tow mugs full of blackness, no kettle and if you try to use the electric plate the power will get down at once and you will be covered by darkness

7-it’s very tough experience to try to have a shower or even to wash your hands in what she calls shower or bathroom.

8- there is no place to keep any of your belongings, no cupboard , bed table , disck or something like that.

9- if you try to use her dinning table, defenetly your head will be injured by the roof.

about her behaviour:

1- she meant to restrict the payment in order to make use of the good location of the place and the deceiving photos on the the site which makes unable to get refund when you se the place

2-tries to pretend that she is helpful in order to deceive you more until you pay your money that you can’t get it back

3- she attacks any faithfull review in a very bad way to scare guests to mention it.

unforunatly,I did a complain about this to Airbnb , but they didn’t take any suitable action.

strongly , I do believe that such host destroy the Airbnb reputation

[David126]

@Adel14Did you leave a review?

[Scott276]

Poor you, that sounds really hellish. Sounds like the voices in her head may have said “hey, you can make some money from this minging hell hole you call a home then we can furnish it together from garbage dumps and car boot sales” 

sometimes I do believe it’s better to cut your losses and 100% make sure that these poisonous cretinous money grabbing street dwellers don’t get the chance to rob you and ruin your holiday at the same time. 

Yes Airbnb seem unresponsive with replies when it comes to dealing with bad hosts, and rude unwelcoming behaviour. 

Sorry to hear of your troubles

[Emanuel77]

Meanwhile I am waiting for the reactivation of my account after a guest ( a "reserver", the guests were people i never saw on the app) reclaims i am responsible for these guests losing the car while parking in a ilegal manner. He uses an issue i had with this guests, who broke one rule about using the wrong shower,  to report me for innapropriate behavior and invasion of privacy, as i come to the opened door of that (shared) bathroom to say that it CANNOT be used, the second time. The guest couldnt even speak english.  So, after this, and reading greate Superhosts having similar problems,  I go to another host website. Is it not simple?

[Huma0]

This is a really old post, but it caught my attention, as something seemed off to me.

There are two sides to every story. @Adel14 calls the host 'very greedy and rude' and, yet, in his review of her, which does make a lot of complaints about the apartment, he describes her as simply 'very cooperative' and in response to her review of him, 'Thanks love, We love to have you as a great host but in your other apartment.' Seems like he is talking about two completely different people! 

Meanwhile, the host is a Superhost with nearly 800 reviews. Obviously, I haven't read through all of them, but did read quite a few and all the ones I read were very positive. The apartment seems basic but in an excellent location and, while some mentioned it was simple and one mentioned a bit dark, I didn't see any mentions of cleanliness issues or lack of amenities, rather the opposite. The one thing that is repeated over and over and over again, is what a lovely, helpful and accommodating host Silvia is. 

Her response to @Adel14 's review tells a very different story from the one he has posted here:

"I have been hosting people for four years and I am happy to say that I met a lot of very good people. Unfortunately this is not the case. This man started complaining months before his arrival claiming that I changed the price of the apartment after his booking. He also called airbnb saying that I was cheating him. I spent days trying to convince him that it's not possible to change prices after a booking. About their stay, they called me saying that the hot plate didn't work, and they hadn't switched it on, that the coffee machine didn't work, and they had put the water in the wrong part, and so on. In short, instead of writing false accusations to take revenge for the wrong idea of having paid more than they would have to, they would have simply canceled their booking and stay in someone else's apartment (poor him)."

Which actually makes sense in the context of his comment: "tries to pretend that she is helpful in order to deceive you more until you pay your money that you can’t get it back"

Seems like it might have been money, and not a 'bad host' that was the problem after all...

[Marit-Anne0]

airbnb hell ?   https://www.airbnbhell.com/airbnb-guest-stories/

[Doris99]

I had a last minute cancellation by a host once, and another host did not provide WIFI ( which was listed as available) and did not response when we request it. 

This is the 3rd time we are having host who are deliberating bad: The host trying to charge us extra cleaning after we actually spent quite a lot of time cleaning the place before we left and even help take about garbage bins. The host didn't provide a lot of the things in the listing, for example they don't have an curtain in bathrooms and toilets, and the oven doesn't work. We kind of suck it up and still be nice to host as it's during X'mas, and we are trying to be kind. But the host left me a review saying we didn't clean her place and trying to charge us $160 AUD, and said that we are supposed to clean and tidy her place like we got it. How is it possible? We are not professional cleaners! I was so naive and trusting that I didn't take any photos as evidence. Renting via Airbnb became so stressful and nasty, and Airbnb is now one of those irresponsible real estate agents. 

I'm actually really disappointed about this as I had good Airbnb experiences before. After googling about this, that's a lot of bad guest experience and Airbnb is not doing anything to hold the host accountable for what they advertised.

I'm not sure if I will use Airbnb again, at least there's proper regulation for hotels. Airbnb is like a draw of luck, no guarantees. 

[David126]

@Doris99

A Host is allowed to charge a cleaning fee, and this would be charged as part of your booking.

They are not allowed to charge a cleaning fee afterwards.

So just say no.

Sadly many people seem to list without understanding what they are doing. Look for a Host who has a few bookings under their belt and has worked out how things operate.

[Nadine315]

I've come to the conclusion that the Airbnb rating system has to be taken with a grain of salt. I've had 3 out of 4 experiences that were pretty good. The last was less than stellar to say the least. The host told me that he would rate me after he saw my rating. In other words, you can have a host give you a bad rating if you give them less than a good rating.

There was black mold in the shower I was to use, the kitchen was filthy, garbage smell on the way to my basement room that was next to the laundry room. Noise at late hours, loud phone conversations at 12:30 am so it's not the most restful stay. Loud exercise machine right outside the door, a fire alarm that beeped all night because the battery hadn't been replaced.

Any guests that made comments about the cleanliness got a nasty reply. The room itself was clean enough but it's worrisome to have a sink that doesn't drain or mold. Guests try to be nice in their comments but read the comments carefully. From now on I will be more cautious.

[Helen3]

Sorry @Nadine315 that is not possible. Both reviews are left blind so the host can't possibly rate you AFTER seeing your review.

Sounds like an awful listing, why on earth did you stay there rather asking Airbnb to cancel when it wasn't as described?

[Nadine315]

Because I had no other options but to stay and could not book another place in time and it was an area that didn't have many choices. I'm not sure what you mean by the reviews being "blind". He most certainly could see what was written and didn't rate me until he read my review.

Let's just say that I ate out and had sponge baths.

[Helen3]

Sorry  @Nadine315.

But you are not correct about this. The host couldn't possibly have seen what you wrote before posting their review.   As it says in Airbnb's Help Centre.....

How do reviews work?

All the reviews on Airbnb are written by hosts and travellers from our community.

You have 14 days after checkout to write a review for a trip. Reviews will be posted once both the host and guest complete a review.

[Nadine315]

"5. Hosts get to review you

This has got to stop. In no other aspect of life does a business get to review their paying customers. This is great to establish trust and for a host to know who they are hosting, but after you’ve had 5 or 10 reviews, you don’t need to continue getting “reviews” from your hosts. Besides, reviews on AirBNB are much more valuable for hosts because they get additional business because of them.

Furthermore, this contributes towards the dishonest reviews you see on AirBNB. You know that your host is going to review you as well and you will thus only want to say nice things about them. Yes, the reviews are secret until both of you have reviewed each other, but it’s still a contributing factor. Plus, your host gets to respond publicly to the review you have left and there are many instances of hosts blaming their guests on AirBNB."

The guest doesn't have the final say. I've seen guests try to say something to this host only to be berated. It didn't depend how gently they tried to point something out.

[John1080]

@Nadine315, I appreciate your opinion when you say that hosts should not be able to review guests, but wholeheartedly disagree. As hosts, who allow strangers into our homes, we rely on the reviews of other hosts to assure we are getting good guests who will respect our homes and allow us to maintain a degree of safety. Likewise, guests rely on honest reviews from other guests to assure that a listing is clean, safe and up to standards. 

Neither hosts nor guests can see a review until both have left one or unless 14 days have passed if only one person leaves a review.  Now, if a guest or a host were to contact the other person in the equation with a complaint before leaving a review, the person might be able to guess what is coming and leave a negative review beforehand, but I think that is probably rare.  In any event, the reviews themselves are blind until both parties leave one. 

[Nadine315]

It was a quote from a backpacker blog expressing that opinion (I put it in quotes but I should have stated the source).

It was my experience that the host said he would rate me when I rated him. I'm guessing he wanted to see the comment that went to him directly first.

I reviewed the other reviews and people were trying to be as diplomatic as possible but a couple were berated for doing so. It's my opinion that the host wasn't completely honest in one of his comments to one guest when he was honest about his stay.

In my opinion, it would be better if the rating system was totally anonymous, not just "blind" for a period of time because neither hosts or guests are always angels.