Wifi/ internet Outage

[Kelmany1]

Hi, my internet went down while guests are here. The technician arrives tomorrow. It’s been off for two days total.  

We offer free wifi. We have a McDonalds down the street that provides free wifi. We instructed those who need it to call family to go there. I made sure to message everyone on the Airbnb app so I have clear history of how long it’s down.

Do I need to offer a discount for the days it’s down or leave it as is since it’s due to construction down the street?

Advice please.

Thanks 

[Kanani2]

At 1:36 AM, I received a notice from my client that the cell and internet were down. 

I didn't pick up the message until I woke up, but then found that there's a national (across the U.S). outage in several states, including New Mexico.  And it's not small --it's huge, encompassing hundreds of miles in some locations. This isn't a matter of me not paying the bill, or a contractor down the road cutting the line. It's a nationwide outage, most likely caused by hackers. 

And honestly, I have no inside line from hackers and when they're going to do this stuff.

 What we're left with is a major inconvenience, and while I understand people can't work --the house was never offered up as a place of work. It's a residence, with residential, not business internet lines.

So, maybe the solution lies in adding a disclaimer in our rental agreements?  I'm loathe to offer a discount, but will check to see if any savings is being offered by Century Link.

[Ted31]

This wouldn't solve the problem itself, however, I am thinking about offering a service that would allow Hosts to receive a text/email notification if the Internet connection goes down at their location(s).  The main benefit being it allows the host to possibly get ahead of a problem before a guest notices (i.e, bad reviews, refunds, etc.).  It would cost around $2.99/month, less for multiple locations.  I am curious if Hosts would you use/buy a service like this?  Any thoughts/input folks might have would be greatly appreciated.

[Sarah977]

How would an email notification help if the Internet was down? I wouldn't be able to access my email without a Wifi connection. And hosts can already check the settings to receive text and email notifications of guest messages, so I'm not sure what gap you think this would fill?

[Anna2528]

You have to discount. I paid 630€ for 17 nights in a big city, and no internet. I'm using off my data which is running out and I have no options to buy some more (not a flexible provider). It's not a leisure trip, I came to work. So now I'm left with no internet, working on my personal data, stuck in this expensive place for 2 weeks yet to come. I don't think it's acceptable. Like @Ute42  said, yeah, it's a problem. You ordered fish and chips, only get fish, you get a refund. @Sarah977 , your analogy doesn't work. We already paid and ordered for something that was advertised and agreed. If the waiter tells you there's no chips today, then it's like the airbnb warning you, on the ad, that there's no wifi. The situation is: you order, you receive the partial plate, you paid for the whole thing, and then ofc you're pissed off. How would u react when you get only fish and paid the whole price for menu? ofc any restaurant would discount.

[Sarah977]

@Anna2528  Of course a guest should expect to have the amenities listed. If you booked a place that advertised Wifi and it isn't available, for the entire 17 nights you have booked, or even a significant part of it, a discount is in order. What this thread was originally about was whether a discount is warranted for a brief amount of time that there may be an outage. And if someone has only paid $11/night for a place, it's a bit much to demand a refund if the outage just meant they had to go down to a local cafe to use Wifi once or twice before the issue was resolved. There are degrees of inconvenience. I just don't think some momentary outage of something always warrants a discount- life's not always perfect and works better when people can be somewhat adaptable.