Canceled reservation

[Nina1132]

Hi, 

I wanted to share my experiences and get feedback for the community.

we have guest who tried to cancel reservation in last moment late night before his check in date. Since he holds our weekend date until the last moment and our strict cancelation policy we couldn’t accept his request for refund.

On the check in date he didn’t announced late check in, he arrived at midnight, he purposely broke the bad and made bad look dirty just to have reason to cancel.

she was so smart and contacted Airbnb and canceled reservation.

Airbnb was so unhelpful and disrespectful to us a hosts he accepted his cancellation and refund him payment.

even they could see in the messages that he tried to cancel.

now after all even with canceled reservation he was able to leave us the review.

again Airbnb customer service is not helping us.

Did someone had the same experience?

and how is possible that he had option to leave review when he didn’t say with us.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Nina1132unfortunately if a guest cancels on the day of check-in he is allowed to leave a review.

What do you mean by "she broke the bed"? You mean she broke the bed structure or she just messed and undo the bedding? If she broke the bed you can file a damage claim for repairs or a new bed. 

[Nina1132]

He went through the apartment looking for the reason to cancel. When he wasn’t able to find anything he flipped the mattress and he opened the mattress protector, from the safety reasons not to damage the mattress  when we change mattress protectors we don’t remove the old one, we just put the new on the top.

We assume he step on the frame in order to lift the mattress.

we file the damage claim but the response from Airbnb was negative.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Nina1132  Stories like this really kill any enthusiasm for hosting, right? This so wrong 

[Sarah977]

@Nina1132 @Branka-and-Silvia0  I remember a post here from a host who had a private room listing. When she went out shopping one day, she found that the guest had gone through her entire house, including the host's bedroom, emptying the garbage cans all over the floors and furniture, throwing things off shelves, strewing things around everywhere and taking photos which she submitted to Airbnb to prove the place was a pigsty so she could get a refund.

It's hard to fathom that there are people like this, who would stoop so low to get themselves a free stay or their money back. And what's really shocking is that there seem to be so many of them. What a strange world this has become.

[Nina1132]

Unfortunately we cannot change the people, but hopefully the Airbnb host support can change.

when the intentions are clear and when there is words of Superhost who has two rental apartments and close to 100 good reviews the Airbnb should support the host.

Thank you all for joining this conversation.

[Andrew1962]

@Nina1132 it could be worse. I just posted about a similar situation and not only did I lose lost revenue from the stay and re-cleaning, bad review, but also airbnb is hitting me with the cancelation even though guest already canceled. I hope someone from airbnb support are reading these messages because its extremely unprofessional what they are doing to hosts. Just hoping something can be done about these circumstances and make things right in some regard.

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/Airbnb-canceled-a-guests-stay/td-p/1452353

[Kirsten86]

I sure did, I had guests arrive to my home at 12am.   Did not tell me they were coming that late. It was raining very hard in the area caused flooding and my drainage in my plumbing was not going down. Instead of contacting me and letting me know the guests called Airbnb got them to cancel and issue a full refund. The guests even stayed overnight and left the next morning and they still got a full refund. I had to pay the cleaners out of pocket because they stayed. The rain stopped the next morning and all the drainage worked just fine. 

They were then able to leave me a 1 star review for something that was completely out of my hands....I was so upset Airbnb let this happen to me. Unfortunately they never took the review down but I was able to leave a review for the guest and I left them a honest review of how they treated me and no communication so hopefully other hosts will see the review and not book to them...

[Laura2592]

@Nina1132 hello from a fellow Maryland host!

Sadly the cancellation policy is often a suggestion, rather than a rule. If we have an insistent guest we typically will refund with a percentage held back as a compromise. Otherwise, as you saw the guests are inclined to get the $$ another way which ends up costing you more.

We say "I am so sorry you won't be staying with us. As you are requesting to cancel after X time,  no refund is due. Its too late to re-book the space. But I am willing to make a one-time exception due to your difficult situation and refund (X percent) of your reservation cost as a courtesy. We hope that your plans work out and that you will visit with us another time!"

I emphasize "one time exception" and  "courtesy" as much as possible. As well as the fact that the last minute change in plans really hits our ability to recoup.