I sent this letter to Airbnb Support:
Hello-
I would like to address the issue with canceled reservation **
I’ve been an Airbnb Superhost for nearly 6 years. I have a consistent record of 5-star ratings. I host 4 units (currently 2 are snoozed) all located at the same property. I recently renovated my late father’s vintage barbershop. This unit is listed as a suite as it does not have a shower, just a 1/2 bath. My intention was rent this unit in conjunction with my Large Efficiency unit which connect through an internal hallway and a shared Laundry room (as spelled out both in the Listing Description and in my Welcome Guide).
12/23/20:
I was very excited when I listed the new 2 unit configuration (2 Units Combined! A Great Airbnb Experience!) in early December. They were immediately reserved by the Blank family for 10 days. The communication for the reservation was solely between me Kristen Blank, and was good all through out the process up to their arrival on Wednesday, December 23rd. She and I did a distanced walk-through, and she gave no indication that she had any problems with the place, in fact it was quite the contrary. She was very complimentary. I explained to her that the Laundry room is shared (again, this is spelled out both in the Listing Description and in my Welcome Guide) and that at some point I’d need to do laundry as I am staying in another unit on the property as well. I said I would give her plenty of advanced notice and wait until they were gone. Her response was “No problem, we’re hardly going to be here anyway. In fact, there’s 3 days that we won’t even be in town”. I then told her I would let them get settled in and to text me if there were any questions, problems or if there was anything they needed.
About an hour later I received this notification from the Guest via Airbnb messages:
“We had to check out after learning of the shared space we felt very uncomfortable with our children being in the other room. I hope you have a happy holiday”
I immediately went to see if I could talk to them, but she and her family had already left. I then reached out to her via Airbnb messaging to see if there was anything I could do. She did not respond.
12/23-24/20:
Later that evening I received an email from Michelle at Airbnb Community Support. She stated that an incident had been reported by the Guest and that she would like to speak with me at 5 pm on Dec. 24th (Christmas Eve) to discuss the matter. In the mean time my account access would be limited until the investigation was finalized. I waited until 5:20 on the 24th for a phone call. It wasn’t until I prompted Michelle with an email asking her if she was ever going to call me did she then call. I explained that it now wasn’t a convenient time for me as I had holiday plans. She told me we could continue through email and I told her that would be fine.
12/25/20:
On Christmas Day I received an email from Michelle with questions of which I responded to point by point. I directed her to my listing descriptions as well as my attached Welcome Guides… because once again, several things are spelled out there. I also attached a floor plan highlighting the Guest areas, the Shared areas and the areas that were locked off. I also offered to send a walk-through video to further illustrate the set-up. I never heard back from Michelle.
12/29/20:
On Tuesday 12/29 I received an email from Alejandra of Airbnb Community Support. She stating that my Guest Kristen did not feel safe at my place and was looking for a refund and what did I think?… I responded by telling Alejandra that all of my Units have been suspended and that I would call Airbnb to talk to a live person the next day as this was not okay.
Later that evening I called Support and talked to Luis. I explained to him that:
• My Units have been suspended for nearly a week
• I have never in almost 6 years of hosting ever had a privacy violation with any of my reservations
• I have painstakingly tried to spell everything out in the descriptions of my listings and in my Welcome Guides so that things like this would never happen… and up until now, they never have
• When I created this listing, I duplicated another one of my listings. I have NEVER had a Flexible Cancellation Policy. I have always done Moderate or Strict… so it was to my surprise to find out when the Guest cancelled that this listing was booked with the Flexible policy… so to add insult to injury, I lost out on a lot of income
Luis was very nice and understanding and told me that my matter would be “escalated” to the Safety Team and that I will be hearing from someone within 24 hours. It’s been over 24 hrs and I’ve heard nothing.
In almost 6 years this is only one of 3 bad experiences I’ve had as a host. I take my role very seriously. I have restored a legacy property into 4 unique units including my Dad’s old barbershop. I take great pride in that. I get rave reviews, have repeat guests and have made friends with many. I worked very hard to get this unit ready for the Blank family and to make sure they had a cozy Christmas Airbnb experience. I even stuffed the stockings full of goodies for their 2 little boys.
Airbnb is my main source of income right now. While my property isn’t exactly an over the water villa in the Maldives, it is a crucial time for bookings. Rockford, IL has several visiting nurses and medical students looking for accommodations. New rotations and semesters start soon. Everyday my listings are suspended are days that I am losing potential reservations.
12/30/20:
It has now been 1 week that my listings have been locked. I am very dismayed at the total lack of support with my case. I still do not know what the security violation is that I allegedly committed. It’s a very different Airbnb than when I started. In the beginning you did a very good job with educating both the Host and the Traveller on what it means to build trust. I felt you were very inclusive, and I really felt like I was part of a community. Now I feel like I am just part of a bottom line.
12/31/20:
After no response from Support from the above message which I emailed, I contacted Support Chat. Maryjane P said that a “Support Ambassador” was on it and that I should be getting a response as soon as possible. She said she was merging this communication in to the ticket and then closed the chat.
Happy Holidays
**[Sensitive information removed in line with - Community Center Guidelines]
