What's Happening with Phone Support for Hosts? (and what's a "dispatcher"??)

[Lynn1197]

After a bizarre/awful customer (host) service experience from AirBnb I've been searching online to see what is going on with them. 

I phoned them several days ago for help with something in my listing that I couldn't figure out and, after a significant wait time (not uncommon) reached a person who was a "dispatcher" (??) and could not help, but said she would arrange for a call back. I've never experienced this "dispatcher" thing, have always been helped by the person I reached...

I asked when I could expect a call back, and she said "I don't have that information". What?? When pressed, she said something like "hopefully in a day or two". Are you kidding me? I received an email confirmation re: my call, but still no callback? 

Does anyone knows what is happening here...it's very concerning. I think it's clearly related to the layoffs...either they can't function at current staffing levels or the remaining workers are doing a work slowdown. Honestly, I'd kind of support them in that, but management and ownership needs to know that this is not acceptable and something must be done.

BTW, in searching for related topics on this forum, I see numerous recent posts about hosts not receiving payouts. I haven't checked, but obviously need to...I imagine this is all related, though...Wondering if the company is at risk of going under? BTW, I'm having a fine experience with their major competitor, i.e. phones answered, money flowing...

Any insight would be appreciated...

[Huma0]

@Lynn1197 

CS is a mess right now as you will see if you browse through many of the threads on this forum. They are often not responding to/dealing with really urgent matters, let alone technical glitches.

I have never heard of a 'dispatcher' either, but it is not at all uncommon right now to simply be told that the rep who takes your call/answers your email etc. is not qualified to deal with the matter and needs to 'escalate' it or pass it on to the appropriate team. This has always happened to some extent, but seems to be much more common now, so I assume they have hired in a lot of untrained temps.

RE the payout issue, yes this is a general issue that Airbnb has acknowledged on the CC and some hosts have since responded that the payments have started coming through. However, I would advise you to keep track of your payouts because, even if the current 'technical' glitch is solved, I have experience several problems with missing payouts prior to that.

[Alex893]

@Lynn1197 yes, I have encountered that. The woman knew nothing. She could not answer the most basic of questions and was only there to pass on messages. I had three separate issues and she sent it to three separate teams. One was a very simple functionality question and I asked her if she were able to search for an answer on her side. She said all she was able to do was pass on questions. Basically like an after hours call center. I never heard back from any of those teams

[Sarah977]

I've been saying for a longtime that this is exactly how CS should operate- instead of getting cluless CS reps who know little about all the issues hosts face, the calls should just be fielded by a dispatcher and shunted to the correct team, that is fully knowledgable about that aspect of the platform. 

But of course, I was basing that on the assumption that the issue would be dealt with in a timely fashion, not lost in the Airbnb ether, never to get a reply.