I have a successful listing in Sedona, AZ. I have been host...
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I have a successful listing in Sedona, AZ. I have been hosting for 5 years and am conflicted about whether to keep hosting o...
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I'm really hoping someone can help me.
I have been a Superhost since 2017 and have used Ring Peephole & Doorbell cameras in all of my units.
A couple weeks ago, I had a guest throw an unauthorized party in one of my listings. We found out about this from angry texts from the neighbors, and then checked the security footage. Sure enough we could see tons of people coming/going.
Because we didn't want to get screwed on the review, we waited the 14-days until the guest review period had ended, and then submitted a request for reimbursement for the additional cleaning costs. In submitting the claim we included the screenshot from the peephole camera.
The picture we provided showed the interior of the home, as the door was open.
The guest then used this against us and made a report that they felt unsafe and uncomfortable as we were recording the inside of the home.
This instantly got our reimbursement claim dismissed, and more seriously, the listing unlisted for several days, and then demanded that we add a disclosure about the camera to our listing description (which made no sense as it was already there, as it is with all our properties) as well as confirm that we re-read Airbnb's community standards again. They then said:
I am sorry AIrbnb are not being transparent about why you have been suspended for a second time.
However I have to ask if you have a doorbell camera why aren't you monitoring your listing to make sure only those who have booked are using your listing, rather than the poor neighbours having to contact you when the party at your listing is in full swing.
If you monitored your listing when guests were checking in, you would have been able to stop the party before it started by going down and evicted the guest who booked. @Twenty-Nine-Nights0
You are an airbnb management company with multiple properties so should really have proper vetting and monitoring systems in place to minimise the risk of parties at the properties you manage.
To make things worse you then didn't even bother to leave an honest review to warn your fellow hosts about this guest.
Funny that you mention trying to stop a party. I had a similar experience several days ago. Saw a bunch of people and cars showing up. Called airbnb they cancelled the guest and I had police stop the party, but guess what? My listing is also unlisted for several days now and support wont give me any answers. The security team completing the investigation into who knows what also isn't replying to any of my messages. Different approach but the outcome is the same. I get the feeling airbnb could care less if we hosts make money or not. Being stuck in limbo not able to solve anything through support is not how I pictured trying to make a profit through several airbnbs .
I run a tight ship and have systems, policies, and procedures in place to handle when things don’t go according to plan.
The majority of our guests are lovely and don't cause issues - but from time to time we encounter people that aren’t, and things go wrong. That’s reality.
I posted about one bad guest that didn’t want to take accountability for doing something he shouldn’t. An 'investigation' by Airbnb was launched, we were found to be innocent of the charges, but for a reason I haven't been able to determine, we've continued to deal with issues here.
For all I know - this situation may not even have anything to do with the issue with report and 'investigation'! For all I know it could be an entirely separate issue. But because the system Airbnb has put in place to deal with host issues is convoluted and fractured, I don't have the information I need to fix it.
To reiterate:
As I explained above, Airbnb has launched several investigations on this matter, and in the initial one, we were proved innocent of the allegations and my listing reactivated.
But subsequent to this, the listing got delisted again, and now we find ourselves in a limbo where I can’t speak to the ‘inspection’ team, and the only number I have available to me to call Airbnb brings me to a new person each time, and they keep shuffling me around. I have several open tickets but no information on what that means.
What’s disgusting too is that if there is actually a concern of safety and privacy violations on the part of Airbnb (the camera inside the unit, as the guest reported), they should have shut my listing down. They haven’t - I’m still hosting guests, and have hosted several groups since.
But they’ve ‘deactivated’ my listing so that I’m not able to receive any new bookings on Airbnb.
This ‘investigation’ should have been sorted out within 24 hours, and my account either permanently deleted because I had a recording device inside my unit (ew) or relisted without further issue or delay.
After numerous hours on the phone with Airbnb, I thought I might try posting here for communal support amongst other hosts.
In a nutshell, cameras make poor substitutes for actually physically monitoring what is going on in your place. Their very existence is a real source of discontent with most guests as is.
The real sin is you not preventing the party in the first place which is where Airbnb is really coming from and supposedly is why there were cameras in existence in the first place.
Moreover, your neighbors screaming bloody murder did not do Airbnb or their other hosts any favors. This is really a massive waste of time for everyone.