Thanks so much to you all for the feedback! As for the questions, here’s some clarification:
- The reservation was completed by the second week of March. The host told me he would send half the money 24 hours after the booking was supposed to start and give us a credit to book with him in the fall. We initially asked to move the reservation dates to October, but he nor Airbnb said this was possible and we’d need to cancel. Had we known he was scamming us into canceling, we would not have canceled but instead moved the reservation dates to a time that was open in his calendar and rescheduled again if needed.
- We will be flagging this host to Airbnb since we’ve been unsuccessful with Airbnb support. We did file a resolution attempt with the host for the 1/2 credit back, but it’s been ignored (and Airbnb told us today that the host will not give any credit back).
- We do have proof of the written agreement from host since it was made and agreed on Airbnb’s messaging app. I attached this to the resolution.
- There were many things dishonorable and dishonest: 1) completely lying on an agreement without intention of following through 2) rebooking the reservation and claiming he had no time to rebook (we gave a week notice and saw his calendar booked immediately - with reviews to confirm that he didn’t just block the dates). And 3) I’m assuming we won’t get a credit directly from the host, given how this has all gone.
At this point, it’s not looking like we’ll be able to get any money back. Has anyone heard of a situation where AirBnB would issue a credit for future stays or waive service fees?
I’ve had the pleasure of staying with many incredible hosts that have made my stay exceptional and gone above and beyond. It’s frustrating to know that this Superhost is able to claim the same title many have worked so hard for and there is essentially nothing I can do since I cannot review him and it’s up to AirBnB to reprimand him for violating an agreement and profiting off of an unfortunate personal situation (plus profiting from two bookings at one time).
I understand AirBnB has recently established a Host Advisory Board and would love for AirBnB to establish some new policies to prevent host fraud on their platform. @Catherine-Powell Can you chime in here? Hoping this is valuable policy feedback for hosts. While losing hundreds of dollars personally from this is unfair and frustrating, we want to raise this as awareness to hopefully prevent others from dealing with similar situations where the policy as written does not protect against instances of fraudulent behavior.