ABB CS is not just bad but Dangerous

[Kelly149]

Last night at 1015-ish, a guest made a request to book for that same evening. (We are request only, so I don't have 'last-minute booking' barriers, bc I have to approve all stays anyway)

I was already asleep in bed, but the House Rules were sent over in the chat (the guest had a terrible review in his profile, did not answer the pre-booking questions, and at the time of his request was already outside of our stated arrival times).

At 1215 he messaged in the chat "hey, I need the address, I can't find the place". 

So, then he calls ABB CS. This is where the dangerous part comes into play.

ABB CS talks to this "guest", gives him my address and my phone number and tells him that they'll reach out to me to help. This guest DOES NOT HAVE A VALID RESERVATION. In no way shape or form should he have access to any of my information. 

So, with the new information he's been given this guest locates the barn (not hard to find a big red barn in the city even at 2 in the morning.) Funny though, since he doesn't actually have a reservation, he also does not have a door code. But he is undeterred and pushes thru a locked gate and enters the barn thru one of the doors on the back porch. 

At 7am when we get up we see this thread from the guest and the CS message I received "Hey, Kelly, please help this guest access your place" and I say "how weird that CS didn't tell this guy he doesn't have a reservation when they had the chance" and then we go to check the security cameras to find out about the tresspassing and entry.

So, this "guest" got woken up by the Sherrif's office telling him that he was trespassing and needed to vacate. Well guess what, he's really confused bc ABB CS told him our address and phone number and encouraged him to carry on as if he had a reservation when he didn't.

Bad look ABB. This is not how CS should work. This could have ended quite badly. Knowing if a guest does or does not have a reservation should be CS 101.

I dare anyone in corporate to look into the chats and try to explain to me what happened and what kind of training regimen they'll undertake to better educate CS.

@catherinepowell @Lizzie @Quincy @stefanie @Brian @nate

[Kelly149]

@Huma0  you'd think this would be the kind of thing that ABB would want to be VERY clear about...

ie "you're Requesting for a reservation TODAY, but your Host has until TOMORROW to decide, please plan accordingly"

"you're Booking this now, no refunds after"

Nuance is not the strong suit

[Huma0]

@Kelly149 

I am not sure if something has changed in the wording during the booking process or if there are more clueless guests around these days, or both.

While I have always experienced guests who requested to book or instant booked without sending me the most basic info about themselves and then didn't check their messages/respond to questions, people IBing without realising they had done so is a relatively new thing for me.

As my stays are long term, guests usually book well in advance but, last December, I had a cancellation, which meant that the dates were re-opened fairly last minute. Perhaps most people who book last minute are terribly disorganised, but I was astonished how many instant booked and didn't realise they had done anything of the sort/now needed to pay/should have asked important questions first.

As these bookings were less than two weeks away, the 48 hour grace period no longer applied. I therefore had to call Airbnb several times that week to get them to cancel penalty free for the guests, who were horrified to learn that they were going to lose money if they changed their minds or hadn't read the listing properly (which quite clearly stated "THIS IS A SHARED HOME - YOU CANNOT SELF-ISOLATE HERE!").

[Kelly149]

@Huma0 I'm positive the robots know if a guest has seen silly things like listing text, all photos, house rules and yet the whole site just blindly pushes BOOK, BOOK, BOOK NOW. But they don't care.

The other day, I just wanted to send an inquiry message and I had to scroll and scroll to get to Contact Host and then no sooner that I had entered my note, it starts pinging me "enter your card, you could book now, why wait, it might get snatched up..."

ABB should plaster their offices with the mantra "No booking is better than a bad booking."

They're like the world's worst dating site: we don't care if you like each other, have chemistry or are at all compatible in any way, just go on a first date and let the chips fall where they may....

A good match is a good match and a bad match is a path to ruin.

[Anonymous]

@Kelly149  Dating sites don't want matches, any more than drug dealers want you to find inner peace - that just loses customers. They want you to keep using their product over and over, getting little dopamine hits from the attention and occasional bits of fun, but always feeling like there's someone a little more exciting if you keep on trying out more dates. They've done their job horribly wrong if you connect with someone who makes you feel content to stop swiping. They can't monetize that.

Every tech social brand thrives on malcontent and insecurity, from the pathological narcissism that fuels Instagram to the blind outrage that animates Twitter. Their boardrooms are well aware that their products make people miserable, and they're constantly researching ways to make them more so. Airbnb wants to tap into the same toxic oil well as an emotional brand - that's why they love throwing around buzzwords like "belonging" and "inclusion," which are meant to throw you right back to being a pre-teen wondering which cafeteria table you can sit at without getting humiliated. Adults do not describe their desires and experiences with this kind of adolescent lingo, and that's exactly the point. We're not meant to engage with this product as adults. From the Silicon Valley perspective, it doesn't really matter whether the customer and service provider actually get a good match, or a non-horrifying experience, as long as they keep engaging with the brand.

And is that not exactly what we're doing, right here? 

[Michael5689]

There's been a clear directive of empowering guests to have more power and advocacy in the support sphere at AirBNB.  In general I'm ok with that. 

What is really troubling sign to me is the near disdain being displayed by customer service in many areas that it has led to de-prioritization of provider concerns.  I don't know if it's a top-down directive or a consequence of AirBNB moving it's support staff to other locations + poor training + churn of the pandemic.

What I'm really worried about is that it's a conscience strategic decision on AirBNB's part that 1) there is a near limitless supply of providers so they don't need to pay as much attention to home owner concerns anymore, or 2) they are relying on concentration of market power tendencies that grumbling home owners will need to stick with them while they are still in their growth phase.

There are very bad apples on both the home owner side and renter side.  I've seen a number of superhosts with comments on here that I would NEVER want to stay in their homes as I think they have unrealistic expectations.  A fair number of these complaints on this "host circle" are unreasonable as well.  I'm glad they've gotten rid of security deposits as their enforcement policy of them was not being honest and straightforward with hosts so they needed to ditch them explicitly anyway.

That being said AirBNB needs to figure out a way for customer support to more regularly play a mediator role rather than as primarily an advocate role for the guests.

AirBNB corporate needs metrics to look at these support request resolution outcomes if they don't already because anecdotally this is not looking good right now from the host perspective.  If we really do go into recession they are going to lose a lot of short-term hosts for the stability and less effort/conflict resolution required of long-term.

Mike

[Sherry346]

I think the "endless supply" of hosts, that's ending. 

- Cities are banning STR as fast as bills can pass.

- Booking dot C o m is catching up fast, and still far behind - but gaining.

- abb fast suspensions and consequences are making people very very angry, and they talk.

[Michael5689]

I think booking has a good chance on the more centrally located properties but so far my experience with a more destination vacation property is that it's just not a go-to spot for travelers.  That's the segment where the by-owner site competes more directly.  I'm just not seeing a traffic shift to those yet despite practically the same listing.

[Sammy-L-0]

I joined the by owner site about a month ago and have had no reservations at all. On top of that, my ABB reservation have tanked. I suspect ABB might be reducing our visibility after we synced calendars with the other site.a

[Sammy-L-0]

I have also noticed some Superhosts who have very unrealistic expectations. I wonder how some ever get a booking. I also read horror stories about guests that make me question if I want to keep doing this.  Luckily, I have had good guests. The only questionable booking arrived at 1 a m. And left the space clean and caused no problems.

I now have my listing set for a day's notice before a stay and guests can't book the same for the day another guest leaves.

[Louise1073]

Wow that is nuts. Honestly I would completely blame AirBnB in this case, they should not give out these details!!

is it possible to prevent these kinds of last minute requests? Under no circumstances would I ever accept something so last minute, surely there’s a way to block these from even coming through.

[Sherry346]

I am 90% last minute, by the airport, it IS our entire business. It's more helpful to get to know the different ways of handling it.

[Kelly149]

@Sherry346  I can think of absolutely No Way of “handling” a CS giving listing info to a NOT BOOKED “guest”

[Sherry346]

Good.

You go ahead and handle CS with that approach. It will work sometimes, you'll find out how unrestrained they are and don't have supervisors when they work from home with their dogs barking in the background

[Emiel1]

@Louise1073 

When "same day reservations" is allowed (notification time) in a listing, it also has the option to set a time limit (time until a reservation can be made on that day).

[Louise1073]

I didn’t know that, thanks!