@Catherine-Powell Congratulations on your new role Catherine! I am completely new to this community but hosting for years. I have only clicked in here in my pursuit of answers. Your appointment, along with the interview Brian Chesky did last month, for the Sunday Times (Ireland edition) is reassuring in that you are both talking about a back-to-basics focus on hosts.
There are a couple of things I would like to amplify:
Airbnb customer support is beyond frustrating 🤷- I have only recently experienced it and it seems as though the agents are equipped only with the FAQ and the resources that are already available on the website. I can read - the content on the website is super useful! Airbnb hosting is not my full time job. It's a way of making additional income. I need to get fairly quick resolutions to the specific questions I have about namely my listing's rating score (why isn't there a deadline on how far back you go to do the ratings average? My rating score is based in reviews that go back more than 5 years and the rental has had a complete overhaul in the past two years - I am aiming for my Superhost badge). But neither agent I dealt with last week had the competence to even engage in - never mind actually resolve - my query.
I have been an Airbnb guest and when we ran into trouble with a host, the support was amazing. However now that I need support with my listing as a host, the agent is unable to resolve my issue pointing me towards existing generic content or telling me another team member will be in touch - which still has not happened. The agent's message appears only to be "accept the booking or if you cancel you will be fined". Of course this is not the agent's fault: they are doing what they have been told or trained to do. The 'first contact resolution rate' is an alien concept in Airbnb and if you can address this by revamping the skills set and authority level of your call agents, I think you will solve a heap of other issues.
Second issue is that wire transfers take very little time these days, so why doesn't Aibnb recognise this? It is astounding that an email notifying about a payment today (3rd September) comes with this notice:
"This should arrive in your account by Sep 10, 2020, taking into consideration weekends and holidays". It would be quicker possibly to post a cheque.
I don't envy your role but I admire your commitment and energy. This is all fixable. The platform has succeeded because it so brilliantly solved a problem, like all great entrepreneurial ideas do. Airbnb has a community of hosts rooting for it to succeed. I'm rooting for you.