Request host AND guest perspective on this?

[Lori2103]

So, wonder if anyone else has experienced this.

Back in January we booked a trip to Spain in August.  We booked with a number of hosts.  

Then the pandemic hit.  We didn't cancel anything, as we were hopeful that a corner would be turned and we would be able to travel by August in some capacity.  

THEN our airline announced that they were resuming flights July 23, however our route had been cancelled.  They have cancelled our flight and all Toronto-Barcelona flights for the remainder of the summer.

I have managed to work out with the airline a future travel credit (because we WILL be taking this trip when we can) and all of our hosts were very lovely and understanding people and we will definitely be rebooking with all of them when we reschedule this trip.  Except one.  This host is NOT a small family type of business  - they own an entire building and have a number of apartments and have for years.  They flat out refused our refund saying they were open as of July 1 and we could still go, completely disregarding the fact that our flights have been cancelled.  

SO, I cancelled so that

1.  The host would still have time to rebook with someone else (I was still hopeful at this point that something could be worked out eventually) and didn't want to prevent a room from being rebooked that I knew we could not use; and

2.  I could not escalate to Airbnb until my request for a refund was officially rejected.

The past few days have been crazy.  AirBnB says that my booking was caused by Covid - however I wasn't covered under that policy because it expires on July 31 and my stay wasn' t until August 26.  So I then asked about the regular policy for extenuating circumstances regarding flight cancellations.  They say I'm not eligible for that either because the cancellation was caused by Covid (even though my airline is still flying to many other places - just not this route).  I guess I am not eligible for ANY type of extraordinary circumstance policy?  They also say that if the covid policy is extended they will not revisit it.

Is Airbnb trying to get guests to hold on to rooms they cannot use because nothing is covered?  I could have held on to the room preventing the host from being able to rebook it until the very last minute - likely resulting in any empty room.  

Because that is what I will do from now on if a host rejects a perfectly reasonable refund request like this.  I was not saying I didn't *want* to come and choosing not to stay, I frankly had no choice as my flight was cancelled with no option of rescheduling it.

Has anyone had any experience with this?  It is beyond frustrating - and I'm sorry for all future hosts I will book with because I will hold on to my booking until the last minute from now on.

[Lori2103]

PS - I was not offered the choice of a cancellation or refund.  I could fight it through insurance (probably) but by the time it would have all been sorted it would probably have been too late anyway - and I still wouldn't have my flight to Spain.

[Lori2103]

I had a whole response here which seems to have disappeared.  I'm not going to type it again except to say:

1.  I know this.

2.  I know this too.  This was a business decision taken by my airline once they resume operations on July 23 - they have cancelled this route entirely until next summer.

3.  *Technically speaking" this is not a direct cause of covid but a business decision taken as an indirect cause and I feel should be covered under the regular policy.  There seems to be much confusion on their end.

4.  I did not choose a credit over refund.  I was not given the choice.  See my other post in response to yours.

[Sarah977]

@Lori2103  FYI this site can be glitchy- posts that you've spent time composing can just disappear, it's really annoying. So it's best to quickly copy your post before pressing Reply, so you can repaste it into the message box if that happens. Then copy it again before clicking on Reply again, but it will usually go through the second time, in my experience.

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@Lori2103 

Airlines like to make people *think* they don't have a choice and just have to accept credit - this is not true. 

And from your OP "2.  I could not escalate to Airbnb until my request for a refund was officially rejected.", my understanding is that this is incorrect.

You don't need the host to agree to a cancellation or agree to refund you. Also, if you think you are or should be eligible for a refund beyond the agreed cancellation policy the ONLY way to override this is to contact Airbnb CS, get the Airbnb CS to agree to what you think is right, then have the CS rep approve the refund while processing the cancellation and this all needs to happen before the cancellation is officially confirmed. 

[Lori2103]

Re: your first paragraph.  It wouldn't have mattered.  Even if I  disputed, I still did not have the option to reschedule my flight until next year.

Re your last paragraph.  That is completely not true and not what is stated on their website.  I cannot post a screenshot but here is word for word what it says on the site:

"If your reservation doesn't qualify automatically, continue cancelling your reservation and then contact us to file a claim."

If you have different information that I have to call before cancelling and that this is the ONLY way to do it, this is what is posted directly on the Airbnb site (which I read before cancelling).

[Anonymous]

@Lori2103 

"Is Airbnb trying to get guests to hold on to rooms they cannot use because nothing is covered?  I could have held on to the room preventing the host from being able to rebook it until the very last minute - likely resulting in any empty room.  "

The problem comes down to cash flow. Airbnb does not release your payment the host until shortly after the check-in date. So when they have thousands of cancellations coming in, it's in their interest to stagger the eligibility windows so that they still have the funds for all those bookings from August onward to work with. To say this has been frustrating and confusing for guests and hosts alike is an understatement.

One thing that does seem puzzling is the discrepancy between the cancellation policy you remember booking under and the one applied at the time you cancelled. When a booking is confirmed, Airbnb emails you a receipt that includes the full text of the cancellation terms that apply at the moment you booked. Check your email folder for the title "Your receipt from Airbnb":  what does it say? If it specifies a policy other than Strict, this will be your most useful argument going forward.

The issue of your airline cancelling the route you planned to take does not qualify as an Extenuating Circumstance, because in the terms of the policy you'd have to also submit proof that there are no other means of transportation to your destination (such as other flight connections on different airlines). The fact that your airline issued a credit instead of a refund is one I can definitely empathize with - same thing happened to me recently - but it's also not one that should be of any concern to Airbnb or your host.

And while it's common for guests to seek leniency for cancellations under the pretext that they intend to rebook their trip at an undetermined time, hosts know that the odds are vanishingly slim that this will work out since the availability of one or a small number of units would have to magically align with your travel dates. The nature of this pandemic only reinforces this point; it's become increasingly clear that the recovery/re-opening process is going to be a very non-linear one, as new outbreaks emerge and restrictions are re-introduced. I can hardly blame people for making long-range travel plans for the sake of having something to look forward to, but at this moment of chaos they're a hail-mary at best.

[Lori2103]

Hi @Anonymous .  I do understand the host's perspective, truly.  Everyone has suffered under this.  

I think I responded in another part of this thread that I no longer have access to that email as it was a work email that I no longer have access to (another one of many lessons learned).  There was confusion in my accounts - there ended up being two which I called to have merged and email address changed, which ended up in two actual accounts - all my other bookings are on the other one and this lone booking remained on this one).  It's a mess, but won't be booking with this one going forward, if indeed I ever do book again.  

I always book overseas trips months in advance - we travelled to London and Italy last year and those were booked months in advance as well because waiting until the last minute results in a severe lack of choice in bookings.  I will indeed be rebooking this as the desire to travel to where we booked has not changed.

Your points are fair, however there were six of us travelling.  It's not reasonable to expect us to pay double (in the range of over  $8,000.00) to book duplicate flights on another airline to keep a 3 day stay.  Anyway, it's neither here nor there at this point.  Airbnb is ignoring me completely so I'm not hopeful I will come to any resolution.  The other hosts I had booked to stay with were wonderful, it's only this one who is being unreasonable (in my opinion).  We never had any intention of cancelling and indeed didn't until the airline cancelled the flight.

I think this host's refusal is very short sighted and bad business.  I have many friends with businesses and family members who have lost jobs, my friends with business' have tried to be very accommodating in the hopes of business relationships going forward when things return to normal (which they will eventually).  I lost a (relatively) small amount in the grand scheme of things, but this host has lost a lot more, just from my booking alone as this was *not* an inexpensive booking and the remainder of my booking was obviously double this.  So, they get to keep $700 of my $900 deposit, but lost the $900.00 of the rest of my stay (that I would have rescheduled) as well as my friends booking (who hadn't booked yet but was going to stay there as well, but held off once the pandemic hit, thankfully).  They also lost word of mouth to all my friends who travel (and there are a lot who travel extensively using Airbnb).  Yes, I'm only one person, but how you treat one person says a lot.

All this being said, I DO have sympathy for hosts.  I really do.  I don't think Airbnb has treated them fairly either.  BUT, I am not Airbnb, I am a person who found herself in a very difficult situation as well.

[Anonymous]

@Lori2103  I can't answer for the host's strategy there, but I'd guess a host who's strapped for cash would rather keep the guaranteed income that comes with upholding his cancellation policy, than lose everything to take a complete stranger at her word that at some undetermined point in the future she intends to re-book. By the time you or your friends are ready to make this trip again (and you can't possibly be certain that any of you will), this host may have already left Airbnb, sold the property, or shifted to long-term tenants - all of these choices have been made by huge numbers of hosts in the wake of the pandemic. 

And while word of mouth among friends is essential for some types of businesses such as restaurants, bars, and resorts, it's not really a thing for most Airbnb hosts. The ideal guest chooses a listing because they've done a carefully filtered search and found that it was the best fit of the available options for their travel dates, desires and budget, not because it was recommended by a friend. As flattering as it is to receive a word-of-mouth-generated inquiry, these very seldom ever convert to actual bookings, because there's very little chance that all these parameters are going to be a match. 

Will things related to travel go back to "normal"? Well, Airbnb's CEO emphatically believes that it won't: https://www.dezeen.com/2020/06/23/travel-coronavirus-airbnb-co-founder-brian-chesky/   He may turn out to be wrong, but the fact that this is an organizing principle of the major players in the industry right now leaves not much of a pathway back to the old normal.

[Lori2103]

@Anonymous 

"The ideal guest chooses a listing because they've done a carefully filtered search and found that it was the best fit of the available options for their travel dates, desires and budget, not because it was recommended by a friend" 

This is what I do for my bookings - as well as reviews as a host can describe their property however they like and, let's face it, there are some scammers out there on both sides.  The ultimate word of mouth referral as I won't book with anyone with no reviews.   I also booked a London Airbnb last year based on rave reviews from a (real life) friend.  It does happen.

I doubt they're planning on leaving airbnb - this wasn't a small host - they are bigger and own an entire building.  The listing is still there for my dates and with a flexible cancellation policy.  Of course I don't have a crystal ball so who knows.

In the end it doesn't matter, I'm not going and they're not refunding.  And yes, I can be absolutely certain that we will be ready to rebook as soon as we can (likely next summer now as don't have the option this one).  We would not have cancelled now if we had been given the choice and it's why I didn't spent months fighting my airline for a refund because I know we will.  The only thing that will change is where we're staying (by choice in this case and in the event our other hosts leave airbnb in the others).

I wish everyone the best getting through this situation.