Login issue and then all bookings cancelled

[Mirco-And-Jasmin0]

Hello,

I had the most annoying and disturbing thing happen to me today!

I am a superhost and I could not log-in to my account today.  When I wanted to log in, the website asked me to provide my phone number for a confirmation code. After I received the code and typed it in, the website then continued to create a new account for me, instead of logging me into my existing account. I phoned airbnb support and one team member was able to restore my account after one hour. So now I could log in again, but soon after discovered that all my future bookings were CANCELLED and my guests received a cancellation notification from airbnb. 

I had to contact all of my guests to ensure them, that I did not cancel and to be patient until we resolve the issue. My guest that was supposed to come the next day got scared and booked a different place. Now I am out 4 days of money (I hope I will still get paid by airbnb).

I was advised by a support team member to edit my listing an reactivate it, which I did. Then I was supposed to tell my guests to rebook their dates. However after reactivating my listing the cancelled bookings still showed up in my calendar, which means that the guests cannot rebook as the dates are blocked on my calendar.

No one is getting back to me from support to advise me what to do next. My guests are all scared and ask if they should book a different place. I can understand them, because how does this look? It looks like a scam.

I was on the phone for hours with different support people today and the problem could not be solved so far. Did this happen to anyone else and did anyone find a solution? I am lost and have no idea what to do!

[Patricia2915]

My issue is still not resolved. ALL MY BOOKINGS have been cancelled.  I've contacted by guests to let them know but two have already booked elsewhere.  I expect to be compensated for lost income.  This is my first hosting experience and definitely not a good one.  After the restrictions due to COVID I was looking forward to an income and that has all now been wiped.  i expect someone from airbnb to tell us:

1. What happened

2. what are they doing to fix it

3. how will they compensate us if we lose our bookings

[Andrew2119]

Lizzie,

When will all AirBNB employees know about this issue? Guests call looking for answers about why their reservation are canceled and still being told the host deactivated the listing. They assume AirBNB would be giving them the most accurate information. I would think that a AirBNB service rep would at least notice that the cancellation seems unusual and should be looked at closer. Guests understandably are going to believe AirBNB employees over the host.

[Lizzie]

Hello @Andrew2119,

Great to meet you. Thanks for highlighting this. All Community Support agents should be aware of the technical glitch. Il will flag you message to the team though to follow up.

Thanks again for letting me know. I'm sorry that you didn't have the best experience. 

Are you still experiencing any issues with this? 

Thanks,

Lizzie

[Sarah977]

I'm glad this is getting publicized. How is it that other websites can do "routine maintenance" without creating outrageous glitches that severely impact their users? Every time Airbnb starts messing around with their site it results in some glitch. And no matter how may users it affects, it's always characterized as "affecting a small number of hosts and guests".

@Alece0

[Alece0]

@Sarah977 - I agree about the ridiculousness of these things always being characterized as "affecting a small number of hosts and guests". A quick glance at Twitter and this forum indicates otherwise. I've talked to over a dozen customer support agents in the past 12 hours and none of them are even aware of this "glitch". It's beyond exasperating.

[Emilia42]

@Sarah977 Maybe I am some naive young adult but I would think that a multi-million dollar tech company would get reports on the hour of how their technology is performing. So that a 10% raise in cancelations in a given hour is noticed quickly and the error is corrected before we even have a chance to check our calendars. 

[Sarah977]

One would also think that when they have a system-wide glitch, that a notification would immediately go out to all their customer service reps alerting them to it, instead of hosts getting clueless reps on the phone 48 hours after the fact who seem to be unaware of the glitch. @Emilia42

[Emilia42]

@Sarah977  It's truly mindboggling. 

[Mirco-And-Jasmin0]

If you get help from Airbnb or not depends on who you get on the phone. I called several times yesterday and no one could help me to restore my cancelled bookings or open up my calendar again. I waited until 1.30pm the next day in the hope that someone would contact me, but of course nothing happened. So I called again this afternoon and I finally had someone competent on the phone that was able to help me open up my blocked calendar. That is great, but as a result all my bookings now disappeared from my calendar, so that I had to send my guests a special offer which some of them luckily accepted. It was a lot of work, but at least I can move forward again.

I really hope that Airbnb compensates us for those bookings that we lost, because some guests booked a different place.

Conclusion: Call them a lot of times until you get someone capable on the phone 

[Lizzie]

Hello @Mirco-And-Jasmin0,

Thanks for the update on your calendar and contacting your guests. I was just about to ask you if you are still experiencing this, so I glad to hear there has been some movement. 

I'm also closely following this here in the Community Center and highlighting any issues hosts are still experiencing. I'll also continue to share any further updates I get around this. 

Best of luck with your future bookings and I am sorry you got impacted by this. 

Hope to speak with you again,

Lizzie

[Kurt-And-Summyr0]

Again, we are in the same boat.  Upcoming guests have been contacting me all day and I have no information.  I recieved one all from support today regarding one canceled res.  He seemed clueless to the fact I have called 10 times and our acct has been hacked.  He continued on with his script reading and said there would be no penalities.....no penalties?  Well thats mighty freaking generous.  Im at my wits end. I have no way to allow these guests to rebook.  Many have chosen other properties in panic and are now locked into those reservations.  I really need some answers/advice/info/updates.  There is no work around for me to get my guests back.  Why cant airbnb reach out to affected guests and rebook?  Please help!!!! 

[Mirco-And-Jasmin0]

Is your calendar still showing the cancelled reservations and are your dates therefore still blocked? If yes then you have to get someone from airbnb to delete all those reservations and unlock those dates on your calendar. I was lucky today that I got someone on the phone that knew how to do it.

Once that happens you have to send all of your guests a "special offer" which they have to accept. When this is done they are booked again. My tip is to take a photo of your calendar before the support team deletes the reservations, because it makes it easier to remember which dates the guests booked. 

It sucks because it is a lot of work. And some guests might not rebook with you. But it seems as if this is the only way. I used the confirmation emails that Airbnb sends to figure out how much the guests paid and how much my payout is, so that I could send them a similar price again.

[Lizzie]

Hello @Mirco-And-Jasmin0, @Alece0, @Andrew2119, @Patricia2915, @Kurt-And-Summyr0, @Ricardo85, @Carlos-Alberto25,

Thank you so much for your patience with this and for providing extra details. I wanted to come back to you with the latest update which I hope you'll find useful. 

In regards to the technical bug that occurred on November 11th, our Community Support team is continuing to actively work with impacted guests and hosts to rebook their previously confirmed reservations to the greatest extent possible.

I know a number of you have mentioned that your calendar is still blocked, thanks for your feedback. Based on this, we escalated this to the product team and we believe we’ve found a fix. Would you mind checking on your side to see if your calendar dates are now available again? Fingers crossed this has updated for you, but please let me know if you are still experiencing this issue and we’ll continue to look into it.

If you calendar is all back up and running, please ensure your availability settings are up to date and your calendar remains open so that we will be able to send you any applicable rebooking requests.

Just so you know, if your guest(s) doesn’t rebook, and you don’t receive another booking, Airbnb will make up the difference, up to the original amount you expected from reservations that were impacted by this situation.

Lastly, we’re working diligently in the background to try to prevent issues like this from happening again.

Please do let me know how you get on and if I can help any more.

Thanks again and speak to you soon. 

Lizzie

(FYI - @Sarah977, @Emilia42)

[Mirco-And-Jasmin0]

@Lizzie 

My calendar is unblocked again. I had two guests supposed to come Nov 12-16 and Nov 24-25, that rebooked because of that "glitch". 
I sent everyone else a special offer and they booked with me again. So I will only need a compensation for those two guests. Thank you!

[Michelle2461]

Hi @Lizzie,

Are you saying that Airbnb have provided 100% compensation to those hosts who have lost bookings?? I was also impacted except I had a guest checking in on the 11th and their booking was cancelled the morning they were due to check in - value $700AUD. They could not contact me as all the details were deleted via the cancellation and they ended up booking somewhere else. So I ended up short the booking and as others have attested much grief with trying to get decent help for a problem not of our making. I was advised the maximum compensation I would receive was 50% of the booking. How is this fair?? If other people in my specific situation have revived 100% of the booking back then I expect I should too!