How do I be a tour guide for Airbnb guests in my city?
How do I be a tour guide for Airbnb guests in my city?
In the past week I have had two incredibly frustrating encounters with Airbnb support and I now feel, no matter what the problem, support are simply not worth contacting!
1/......I had a guest stay here, the reservation ending 12 days ago. They loved their stay, we got on like a house on fire and their desire was to leave a great review. They tried to submit their review and were hit with the Error 404 Ice-cream girl. I told them it was possibly a glitch in the system, wait 24 hours and try again.....same result.
At that point I contacted support and explained the situation. The support person, while being very pleasant said he could see an issue with the guests account and told me to get the guest to contact support!
Now previously that support person would have reached out to the guest and fixed the problem, not so now, the problem was thrown back on me to hassle over with the guest. The net result is, I have lost a great review all because support could not be bothered doing their job!
2/......This evening a guest who had stayed here previously sent me a message saying they would like to stay from 4th Feb to the 28th Feb, a nice reservation.
Fortunately those dates were available so I promptly sent them a 'special offer.' Next thing I get this message back.....
That's right, they want to pay, and they are directed to a South African hosts site that I have nothing to do with and did not know existed!
I get onto support and get exactly the same response as I got the other day. It took some time for support to even find the message stream but after considerable phone hold she told me I would have to get the guest to contact support to sort this out.
I said, "Can you please reach out to and speak to the guest and sort this out, if I get them to ring support they are not going to get you personally and they will have to go through the whole scenario again. Also I am concerned I can't block those 24 days from other bookings" She said....."I am not allowed to contact hosts guests"......I am serious, that is for real. At that point I asked to speak to a supervisor, or someone who actually had the authority to talk with both host and guest, or could I at least have a ticket reference to give to the guest that will get whoever they get onto the current state of support for this issue. She told me there was not a supervisor available and she could not tell me when would be available.....and no, she could not give me a ticket number!
The guest is now trying to sort this out, it's 1.00 am here and messages are going back and forth every few minutes. Support have asked me to send a new special offer which on their end showed the full price and I have now had to send another special offer. I am tired and I just want to give up and go to bed!
This whole Airbnb support thing is just plain comical, it does not exist any more. I will not attempt to deal with them any further, it's pointless, it has been outsourced to some crowd who have absolutely no idea how to do anything other than answer the phone. Training appears to be totally non existent and these reps fly by the seat of their pants. It has gone from being one of the worlds best company support options to being one of the worst.
To say I am disgusted is a mild understatement. We hear all these feel good statements from the top that keep on telling us how important we are, but the reality is we are completely on our own, we have no support whatsoever!
Am I angry.......Brian Joe and Nate, you bloody bet I am!
Cheers........Rob
Thanks Liv, I know that you guys go in to bat for us whenever you can, but @Sarah977 has a point. I have been doing this for a few years now (as you know) I don't need other people to fight my individual battles, in most instances I can find a work around. Both of these recent issues have been solved, my guest was eventually able to leave a review, and the other guest was eventually able to book my listing......tranquility has come back to my hosting world!
My issue Liv is a general one.....we just can't get help any more. Let me give you a few illustrations.
In 2017 I received a reservation request from a couple who were 70Kms away sitting on the side of a busy highway. They had seen my cottage was available, and that I accepted same day reservations and they were trying to book but there was some issue with the payment method and their verifications. I got onto CX, explained the situation, the support person immediately got onto the potential guest on the side of the road whilst in contact with me and within 10 minutes the reservation was confirmed and I accepted the guest into my cottage an hour later. I got used to that level of support....instant and effective. Liv, we all looked efficient and good!
Fast forward two years: I have a guest book and arrive for one evening! As soon as he entered he liked what he saw and wanted to extend his stay for another night using a voucher he had received for being mucked around on a previous stay. I told him he could not extend his current stay with a voucher, he could only use it for a new up-coming booking. I told him to contact Airbnb and see if they could help him.
A few hours went by and an IB came in for the next night from another guest! I went to the current guest and asked him if he had abandoned the idea of staying the extra night and he told me, it was all attended to, CX in Manila was extending his reservation. At that point I got a phone call from the CX person in Manila and he told me he was in the process of extending my existing guests booking when he noticed another booking slide in and grab the next night. He asked if I would let him cancel the IB and let that booking be relocated! I told CX I would not allow an existing reservation to be cancelled....Airbnb's policy is, first in gets the booking and that is that. CX assured me it would not be like that, the IB guest would be offered other accommodation with no out of pocket expenses, it would all be taken care of as a neutral cancellation so, I reluctantly agreed. CX told me he would keep me informed and the next morning phoned me and told me the IB booking had been relocated, all was taken care of and I was not to worry about it any further.....great. 6.00 pm that evening the IB booking walks around the corner looking for the accommodation he had booked the previous day. I stood there dumbfounded, here I was with two confirmed Airbnb guests on my property for the same evening. IB guest had a wife and two grizzly kids in the car and wouldn't take no for an answer. I got onto CX in Manila to explain my current situation and to find out what had happened, and I guess his mouth moved but, nothing coherent came out of it....at least not on my end of the phone. It was up to me to whip around the Airbnb hosts I have a liaison with in my area and I was able to relocate the IB guest to another local property.
It appeared CX just left a message on the IB guests phone and thought that was the end of the matter, problem solved.
I realised then, the support I was used to was just not there any more, the entire strategy behind Airbnb support had become one of hand-balling problems.
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Liv, the other night I asked for a supervisor, I was told one was not available but one might be available in half an hour. Twenty four hours later after spending 4 hours the night before trying to get a simple issue fixed I got this message..........
Liv, I didn't need Lexie to state the bleedin obvious to me 24 hours later, and this is where my issue is, support has to be prompt and effective, otherwise.....what's the point in having it.
There is a certain minimum standard that is required of any employment position and many of us here Liv do not feel that Airbnb are providing that minimum standard.
But thanks for you reply and offer to look into my situation, but as I said, all is solved now.
Cheers........Rob
