Coronavirus and Extenuating Circumstances - A Host Perspective

[Tom-And-Rene0]

We have properties in Bali.  Just a quick paraphrase of the many conversations that we are having with guests and AirBnB right now.

From Guest:

Dear Host,
We want to cancel our stay next week because of Coronavirus because we don't want to travel from Australia (70+ cases) / Germany (670 Cases) / France (653 cases) etc. etc.  to Bali (no cases at all).  We await our 100% refund.

Yours truly

Your Guest

From AirBnB:

Dear Host,
Your guest has contacted us and is unable to travel due to the Coronavirus. We have therefore given them a 100% refund under our Extenuating Circumstances Policy. I am sure you as a host are happy with this policy as if a host has to cancel a booking due to Coronavirus, we also give 100% back to the guests.  Either way the host receives no payment at all and so AirBnB is being entirely even handed and fair. 

 
We realise that it is now far too late for anyone else to book your property, but that is not our concern.  Our only concern is to make sure guests book through us again, and by over-riding the cancellation policy the guests agreed to and refusing to consider any travel insurance the guest may have, making the host give a 100% refund is the best way for us to do that.

We wish you all the best of luck in somehow magically finding a way to keep paying the salaries for your staff (we understand you are a fully serviced villa) and covering your villa bills and running costs and lastly finding a bit of cash for yourselves as we understand your properties your only source of income. If you don't then don't worry that is not any concern of AirBnB.

AirBnB values your business

Yours Truly

A Very Junior Person in AirBnB

[Sharon1014]

@Tom-And-Rene0  btw, since you are in Thailand, you might want to watch the Australian 60 Minutes program last night re coronavirus and the animal markets in TH and China.  Link is here

https://www.9now.com.au/60-minutes\

[Pat271]

Thanks @Sharon1014 , I would love to see that, but when I select the link, it says it’s only available in Australia.  Anyone know of a site where this is available to watch in the US?

[Sharon1014]

@Pat271  Hmm not sure if that's the US media laws blocking it or something else.  If you have a 3rd party international server you can use (like Nord VPN (Virtual Private Network)- your server can be set to any country in the world) you may be able to move your server to Australia and fix it that way.  I just tried finding it on YouTube and it is there also but don't know if ppl in the US can access that content either.  Here's the link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7nZ4mw4mXw

[Pat271]

@Sharon1014 The Youtube video is working for me - thanks so much!

[Carlos3005]

I THINK IS NOT A GOOD IDEA TO REFUND 100 % OF THE RESERVATION ,BECAUSE CORANA VIRUS

I THINK THE SOLIDARITY HAS TO GO IN TWO WAYS ,

I THINK YOU SHOULD REFUND 50%,LIKE THAT EVERY BODY LOOSE

IN ANOTHER WAY I DON T KNOW IF YOU CAN DECIDE THAT ,IS NOT YOUR MONEY,EVEN IF YOU HAVE THAT MONEY DURING MOUTHS

OWNER SHOULD DECIDE WHAT TO DO

[Jean-Louis25]

I completely agree with you!

[Natalie-And-Jesse0]

Carlos,

I 100% agree with you and the other Host who lost money.

Jesse

[Sean433]

The slowdown of travel is everywhere and it is just part of the overall economic downturn that seems to have arrived due to fears of this stupid illness. Yesterday was black monday- Cruise liner stocks went down some 25% in just 1 day. That is epic. Airline stocks are trading at 50% of what they were before corona virus. There are so many cheap deals and packages for cruises, flights and resorts nowadays due to the slowdown.

I am sure a lot of us were excited for summer because it is peak season for many of us. There will be a lot less foreigners coming however I do think there will be more locals wanting to stay as there will be more staycations due to fear of travel on airplanes.

On the bright side, once this all passes, it may be a good opportunity to buy into the travel related stocks at a great discount.

[Melanie251]

This is what I'm hoping for! My market is hyper local anyway. Guests are driving from the city for a week or two at the beach. I would expect that even more people are skipping overseas vacations in favor of local - but my bookings are still light for the summer and it's already March! I think the stock market needs to pick up a little before people are willing to spend anything at all on a vacation. Fingers crossed it turns around for all of us!

[Kitty39]

I never receive money before the person actually checks in. Money is paid the 2nd night of stay.

although I have reservations pending for Ireland in July and have paid a deposit. I still plan to go in July.

my Airbnb property is in Louisiana and all of my 3 bookings for March cancelled today after WHO declared this a pandemic

[Hilary187]

We just lost a 2 week booking due to the Corona Virus and despite the guest having Travel Insurance, Airbnb does not care at all about the hosts or their welfare as they stated in the first post "not or concern".

As Hosts, we have bills to pay and a booking of two weeks stopped all other bookings over that period. cancellation only a few days before the booking means all those coming for the event (the reason for that booking) have already made their bookings. We had a 50% cancellation fee to stop this very event, but Airbnb just ignores their own policies when it suits them

We made the booking in good faith, but clearly Airbnb only cares about guests and cares nothing for the Hosts.

[Laila68]

Where is your airbnb based?

[Hilary187]

Further to the above, we knew Sunday that the Guests would be cancelling, but we had to wait another until Thursday for the guest to get off their butt to cancel as were not allowed to cancel the booking, making it even hard on us.

We will definitely be looking elsewhere as if this is the contempt Airbnb has for Hosts, then we will spread our business elsewhere.

[Sarah977]

@Hilary187  If a guest indicates they intend to cancel, but then don't bother to do it right away, I would call Airbnb to get them to look at the guest's message indicating they were cancelling, and to instruct the guest to get on with it, so at least your calendar doesn't stay blocked. 

[Leslie576]

How can she call AirBnB when they are on a 3 day response time due to the inundation of phone calls?  Hosts are at a disadvantage here.