Hi everyone,
Hoping to raise awareness so Airbnb will investigate the problem of declined debit and/credit cards when trying to make a reservation. Please share your similar experiences so Airbnb can acknowledge there's a problem requiring a fix.
My Story, Declined Card Making Reservation
I've used Airbnb for years, booked all over the place between Australia and Europe. I'm also a superhost for a few years.
Yes... My profile and ID is verified... I have sufficient funds to make a reservation.
2021 early February: I tried to book a reservation but Airbnb declined my new ING Bank Visa Debit card. I spoke with customer service. Several messages and hours later I was no closer to a resolution. I received responses from Airbnb like "speak with your bank". Surprise surprise, my ING Bank Visa Debit card does not have a block and it has sufficient funds. ING Bank advised the problem is with Airbnb. Of course, I went back to Airbnb. I was told at one stage "Airbnb doesn't accept debit cards". Since when!? I've been using Airbnb for years and never had this problem before. As I was using a new card I was advised to "just use the old card then".
I continued to ask for an explanation about why Airbnb was declining my card, but I just got ignored on chat.It seems the way Airbnb ignores this topic is by delaying a response with something like "let me investigate for you and I'll get back to you". After a while the chat will then return a message like "do you still require assistance with this topic?" - once you press "yes" a new customer service officer is assigned and you go over the same story again and of course they advise "let me investigate for you and I'll get back to you", the cycle repeats.
Mid February 2021: So I tried to book again after a break from the stress of being ignored by Airbnb. This time I used my TransferWise Visa Debit card. It's one I've used before. Many times. At first I thought, success! The funds are debited from my card. But then the booking didn't confirmed. A message appeared on Airbnb's reservation page "problem with your card". Shortly after that I received an email advising a refund had been processed and that it'll take 15 days for the refund to arrive to my account. So basically Airbnb debited my card, declined the booking and refunded my card. I've never asked for a refund...
I'm now back chatting to customer service over the phone. The response is pretty familiar. I'm told "we'll look into this for you". I told the Airbnb customer service officer I'd been down this path before. She advised me she'd definitely call me within 30 minutes. It's now over 2 hours later, I've messaged her asking for a response and a call back. Response is "I'm assisting a new user at the moment, sorry I didn't call you immediately". She's asked if I booked again... I'm not booking again without a call back as 1) I haven't received a response as to why my cards are being declined. It begs the question, what was done about the problem in the first place? 2) I'm now almost $300 out of pocket, I don't want to just keep repeating the same attempt and lose money each time.
Airbnb Please Investigate
I'm pretty shocked this is happening and nobody seems to have an answer. What's worse is, looking at similar threads on the community hub, many people report being ignored on this issue over several years especially 2018-2020 period. Will Airbnb please investigate?
