A family in Chile has got nothing to eat

[Ute42]

.

.

In another thread a rather sad story has been developing over the past couple of days. This is a long story, I'm cutting it down as good as I can.

Monika in Chile is renting 3 places through airbnb in Chile but she doesn't get paid by airbnb. She started reporting about her problem on sept. 19, adressing  @Catherine-Powell  , to no avail.

Due to COVID she had to close her places on march 20 and reopened mid of august. Monika did get paid from airbnb untill the end of August, but ever since no payment. Monika says she and her husband have lost their jobs due to COVID, couldn't rent the flats and now she's not reveiving money for the completed stays.

Monika has listet a breakdown of outstanding payments for 19 stays, totalling apprx 2400 USD.

Monika has been calling and writing with airbnb every day but nothing. Unfortenately Monika's financial situation has gotten very difficult so in september she had to ask friends to lend her money to pay her bills. „We have two little kids - we can not sleep at night, worried about how to pay bills and buy food when you keep all payouts for 5 weeks“.

Meanwhile as it looks Monika has maxed out all financial resources:

• „Yesterday we were considering for me to go back to London (Monika lived there for 17 years) to find any job as here will be impossible now. We used the credit card limit and now we have nothing left. …. My 9-year-old girl heard this conversation and cried asking me not to go to London and leave them.
  
  It breaks my heart. Once while talking to airbnb , my girl took the phone and asked them, please pay my mum money“

• „Electricity bills, communal charges bills, internet bills etc etc . why, what we have done, please Airbnb pay us all money, we have nothing now, please“

2 days ago Monika received 72,000 CLS = apprx. 90 USD from airbnb. „At least I could buy some food today“ Monika wrote. But the remaining 2400 USD+ remain unpayed.

As I said this is a pretty long story, for details pls start reading here:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Airbnb-Updates/Customer-service-updates-payments-and-more-in-the...

and continue to read there:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Airbnb-Updates/Customer-service-updates-payments-and-more-in-the...

The conversation starts on page 10 and continous to page 11.

This is Monika's airbnb profile Picture: Monika , Domingo, Kyara and Maia

-----------------

I've been getting real emotional over this story. Obviousely I cannot contribute anything to all these payment details, but I have decided to send 100 Euros = 120 USD to Monika in Chile so she can buy more food for her family. In order to do so, today I have set up a Western Union account for international cash payments.

What I'd like to find out is:

• How hard is it to send Money to Chile in the 21st century?

[Ian-And-Anne-Marie0]

@Lizzie  @Katie  

Why has this not been sorted out yet?? What is going on?

[Monika-And-Domingo0]

@Lizzie 

@Ute42, @Sharon1014, @Ian-And-Anne-Marie0, @Super47, @Sarah977, @Colleen253, @Heidi588, @Cormac0, @Helen3, @Mary419, @Alex893, @Inna22, @Emilia42,

Lizzie, what is going on? DO you Airbnb want us to die? We have NO MORE strength to deal with this! I am on the edge of collapsing. 

We have received last night messages from you Airbnb :

Bank Transfer Reversal - p634074640

Airbnb <automated@airbnb.com>

Tue 13/10/2020 23:16

To:

•  You

Hi Monika And Domingo,

We tried to send you money but there was a problem with your bank details (NARR). Please verify your bank details and add them again as a new payout method in your Payout Preferences.

Once the new payout method is created, we will re-issue the payout.

Regards,
The Airbnb team

And the same message again but with another ref number : 

Bank Transfer Reversal - p620244930

Today I went to my account to see this on transaction history :

There’s a problem with your payout methods

There’s an issue with your current payout method. Update it or add a new one so that you can get paid.

Then on the payout account - you blocked my payout default account - and add the message below my correct default payout account : 

Bank Account

DEFAULT

Francisco Domingo De La Vega, Checking •••••9600 (CLP)

Can't process payouts. Remove and try adding again. -    THIS IS MESSAGE FROM YOU AIRBNB 

Remove

Today you sent me 3 emails with the same text:

It's time to get paid!

You replied on Wed 14/10/2020 14:10

Airbnb <automated@airbnb.com>

Wed 14/10/2020 08:33

To:

•  You

It's time to get paid!

Hi Monika And Domingo,

We have an Airbnb payout ready for you, but you need to tell us where to send it. Please log in to your account and add a default payout method so we can send you money.

Add Payout Method

If you have multiple payout methods, make sure your default method is up-to-date.

It usually takes fewer than five business days for a new payout method to be able to accept Airbnb payouts. When the status on your default payout method updates to Ready, we’ll be able to send you your payout.

Thanks,
The Airbnb team

For Christ! We can not take it ANYMORE !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Monika

[Sharon1014]

@Lizzie   Nice sentiment, but that doesn't put food on the table this weekend, does it?  You've been "speaking with Monika on a regular basis over the last few weeks" (or have you, given Penelope's post above?) so in effect, weeks have gone by and still no resolution.

The problem with things like this Lizzie is that when one host is treated this badly, and their legitimate claim is fobbed off without any immediate fix, to the great detriment of that host and their family, it affects all of us.  Because the next time some payments go missing and it takes months to resolve, it could be any one of us this happens to.  To cause such harm to any one of us, is to harm all of us. 

Erosion of confidence is a great way to compel hosts to move to other platforms where hosts control the money from initial booking onwards.

[Ute42]

.

I've got good news to report. Overnight I did get the necessary data from Monika to make a payment and I did. She advised me to send the money to her husband, maybe because he's chilenean and she isn't, I believe she's from Poland.

The payment went through and I think can be picked up in Chile tomorrow.

cc:   @Sharon1014 @Ian-And-Anne-Marie0 @Super47 @Sarah977 @Sarah977 @Colleen253 @Heidi588 @Cormac0 @Helen3 @Mary419 @Alex893 @Inna22 @Emilia42

[Super47]

That's a wonderful thing you did @Ute42, and your kindness and generosity is massively appreciated by @Monika-And-Domingo0  (and yes, their financial affairs are typically in Domingo's name - as is their Airbnb bank account, with him being a Chilean native)

The even better news is that there has now been some movement on her payouts, so hopefully that will continue until she's paid in full. From what I've learned of her warm and genuine character so far, I'd say she'll probably try to send your money back to you, now that her payouts have started to come through, but you setting up the WU account to transfer the money was also an important step in demonstrating just how quickly and easily money can be transferred to Chile when the will to do so is there, so thank you for that too. 

It was Monika's intention to come on the Community Centre tonight to express her huge thanks and gratitude for the care, support and solidarity that everyone who has posted on this thread has shown for herself and her family, and I know she'll be in touch with you personally very soon. She has had a really busy day today though and she's totally worn out with all the stresses and strains of the past month and a half, so I'm really hoping she finally gets some proper sleep tonight, instead of staying up late to post on here!

[Ute42]

.

@Super47   

You wrote:

• I'd say she'll probably try to send your money back to you

Good luck with this project. She doesn't have the necessary data from me to return the money 🙂

[Sarah977]

What's so ludicrous about Airbnb's excuses for not paying hosts, is that when a a payment issue starts getting a lot of social media exposure, or a host threatens to go to the press with the story (or actually does), or, as one host did, had her guests, whose stays, dating back months, she hadn't been paid for, call Airbnb to fid out why the money they'd paid hadn't been released to their host, all those "your bank account details are wrong", "it's a payment issue to your country", "it's a tech issue we're working on" excuses seem to miraculously resolve themselves.

@Super47

[Super47]

Couldn't agree more, @Sarah977 - although I'd be more inclined to use the word 'suspicious', along with 'ludicrous'. It's truly fascinating to see how quickly all these previously seemingly insurmountable 'issues' can suddenly be resolved in the blink of an eye, as soon as there's as much as a whiff of unwanted outside attention being drawn to them. 

[Sharon1014]

@Super47 @Sarah977  I used to work for a very large powerful agency (took early retirement).  At the very top of the priority list in addressing issues raised by the people we served, was not the harm, detriment or suffering being caused by poor decision-making, system failures, absence of funds or maladministration.  The number 1 priority in fixing things was.....

the potential for the issue to hit the media.  Full stop.  Nothing else eclipsed that and it always had to be addressed within 24 hours and was micro-managed by those at the very top of the chain until fixed.

Amazing isn't it what a little people power can do.  Sounds like a great outcome in train for Monika and family.  Very happy for them  😀

[Sarah977]

Pretty sad that this is what our world has come to- damage control instead of caring for our fellow human beings.

@Sharon1014 

[Monika-And-Domingo0]

To all  Angels here ( hosts ) because you are my Angels - Myself, Domingo, Kyara, Maia - we say THANK YOU. No words can describe our gratitude. We thank you for your support, your time, thoughts, your thumbs up, financial support, your fighting spirit. Without you, we do not know what we would do with this endless fight to get our money back, fight which drained us and still there is no end. We got 557.360 CLP because of you. We are waiting for promised 700,000 CLP with the arrival of 14.10.2020 and still, August bookings are not paid as money is in the mist ... We have contacted Argenper here in Chile to send us in writing how they receive the payments from Airbnb  ( for sure they know that money are from Airbnb ). The last payment of 557.000 CLP was done this time in Santiago Servipad.  Our bank details are known probably for half of Chilean. Argenper has offices in many places in Chile as Servipad ( in Puerto Varas we have Servipad based in supermarket Lider ). As Penelope wonderfully described - these methods of sending money are just crazy. I have tried many times ( and I have everything documented ) to ask Airbnb to explain to me how on earth they changed the payout method without my acceptance. How on earth Airbnb could send payments via bank transfer using my details, then changed methods to cash deposits again using the same details from my default payout account and we were getting payments and suddenly from 25.08.2020 all my details are wrong?  Airbnb NEVER replied to these questions, they never even tried. Anyway, I will respond to Lizzie's post with pleasure. 

Dear Ute, tomorrow we will go to collect the money you sent us and I promise we will use them to help others ( thank you enormously for your help ). Penelope, we can not find words to say how much of support you are to us. With my limited English skills, your responses on my behalf are a huge help. All of you who wanted to send us money thank you for your trust - thousands of times, Thank you. All of you here showed so much goodness, empathy, solidarity towards us, values which unfortunately do not exist in  Airbnb employees vocabulary.  Thank you, on behalf of all hosts who were and are asking and waiting for their payments and going through the same nightmare, Thank you. Monika 

cc:   @Sharon1014 @Ian-And-Anne-Marie0 @Super47 @Sarah977 @Sarah977 @Colleen253 @Heidi588 @Cormac0 @Helen3 @Mary419 @Alex893 @Inna22 @Emilia42

if I missed somebody -I apologise.

[Ute42]

.

Originally Monika from @Monika-And-Domingo0   told us that airbnb owes her 2400 USD. 2 days ago she received 557,000 CLP (Chile Peso) which is about 700 USD. So airbnb still owes Monika 1700 USD.

She did get an update from airbnb that she is supposed to receive 700,000 CLP = 875 USD on october 14th. If that payment arrives, airbnb would still owe her 825 USD. But: how likely is it that this money will be in her account on october 14th?

Also, Monika continuous to host for airbnb, she has new guests every week and is, with one exeption, obviously not getting payed for these new stays.

What we have achieved so far are 25% of what we need to achieve and that is: Monika gets all her money owed to her from airbnb. And we are miles away from that, we're not even close to where we need to be.

@Sarah977 @Sharon1014 @Super47  @Ian-And-Anne-Marie0 @Colleen253 @Heidi588 @Cormac0 @Helen3 @Mary419 @Inna22 @Emilia42 @Emiel1 

[Colleen253]

That's absurd. If they can successfully get that amount to her, they can get her the ENTIRE amount owed. Why is that not happening!? 

[Super47]

@Ute42 @Colleen253

The truth is, there's absolutely no reason why they can't get all this money to Monika in one go. Despite the ubiquitous "invalid bank details" excuse (lie) that they've been relentlessly peddling in their desperate attempts to make it look as if Monika has somehow been to blame for Airbnb not paying her thousands of dollars of her own earnings, a small payout of around 90 dollars had already landed successfully in her bank on October 3rd - over a week ago.

So they have literally no excuse for not paying her in full, right now. There's also no continuity or chronological order in the payouts she's received so far - one that had been missing since March, one from October, some (but nowhere near all) from September, the ones from August still on the missing list..

So as @Ute42 rightly says - it's great that at least some of the missing payouts have been received, but there's still a way to go, until Monika has received all her money. And still a lot of serious questions to be answered by Airbnb as regards the structure, reliability, security and indeed legality of their payment methods, payment systems and the processing entities they've selected to 'partner' with in the far-too-often chaotic and shambolic handling and distribution of vast amounts of hosts' money. 

[Paul1255]

Absolute madness! Thanks @Super47 for standing up for @Monika-And-Domingo0 and shining a light in their corner.

Shockingly doesn’t seem that there is an ending is sight, even though the solution seems pretty simple...if some of the missing payments have made their way to the rightful beneficiary, surely the total amount should be able to do the same?

Just press a button and give them their money- if that sounds too simplistic, get someone who knows what they’re doing to press whatever button need pressing to give them their money.

If Airbnb are skilled at anything, it’s taking a molehill and allowing it to turn into a mountain- at the expense of their PR machine.

I don’t come here as often as I used to, but I’ll come here to support this for sure.

Love to those who need it.

Paul 🙂 x