This just happened to me, on Saturday December 11, 2021. The guests checked in the same they booked the reservation on Friday. They were brother and sister. The sister said her brother was losing his eye sight and she flew in to help him to settle in a new place that will work for him. I was moved by this sister and also felt for the brother, since I had an eye surgery myself this year.
Therefore, when the sister said they actually needed to stay until Monday, but could only booked Unit #2 until Sunday, I checked our dates and found her another unit that’s available until Monday. She requested to look at the other unit first and I took her to that unit which I hasn’t done the final walkthrough for checkin yet. She said she smelled gas in that unit, #3, during the walkthrough. I said neither the oven nor the washer/dryer was gas, so probably it was the smell from cleaning products as it was vacant and I hadn’t done walkthrough yet.
She liked Unit #3 and complimented how cute and larger it was. I then asked her if it’s ok she paid extra $97 for an extra day, and she said that’s a good price. So I sent her the change of reservation and she accepted.
On Saturday morning, she wrote if she could revise their reservation back to Sunday as her brother had trouble navigating the stairs. Since we have a minimum 3 night stay, she couldn’t reduce it by a night. Therefor, I sent her the change of reservation. Instead of $97, $27.62 came out to be what she will be refunded. She demanded to be refunded $97.
I then replied, “Would checkout today work better for you?” I sent her another change of reservation which she would be refunded for 2 days and wrote, “ The official checkout time is 11 Am, but we can make an exception. You may check out at 6 PM.”
She replied “Ok, thank you.” 15 minutes passed and she still hasn’t accepted the change of reservation. I wondered if it was more convenient for them to just stay.
Then, I started to recall there’s a wall heater and suddenly thought the pilot light might be out. I wrote, “I can go check I the pilot light in the wall heater is out.”
90 minutes has passed and she still didn’t accept the reservation change or reply back to my request to go in to check.
I went to knock on the door. She answered the door shouting “we are leaving.”
“But you haven’t accepted the change of reservation yet.”
“I am doing it now.” She went to sit down on the sofa while leaving the door wide open.
This is an old house built in 1945. The wall heater is near the front door. When you leave the door open like that to let in heavy wind, the pilot light will be blown out.
I stepped in and said “may I check the pilot light really quick?”
The 6-something foot tall brother screaming and walking towards me, a 4-foot-11-inch tall little old lady, ”we have the place until 6 PM, you have no right to budge in”. He was so loud that the people on the parking lot 100 feet away can hear and even scared for me. Then, the sister demanded a full refund all $430.68 which included the cleaning fee.
Fear for my life, I accepted it and they checked out. However, the reservation didn’t get cancelled afterwards. Airbnb called and emailed me a long list of things I needed to do to get this listing reactivated, such as to hire a professional to confirm the “unsafe feature has been removed” (the gas smell I think”, and “Remember to ask your guest beforehand if they’re okay with you going into the space”.
I then scheduled a plumbing company to come over to make sure everything was fine and documented it.
At 10:13 PM that Saturday, I suddenly realized, this reservation was still active according to Airbnb. Wondering I might get into trouble for sending someone there the next day, so I called Airbnb. To my dismay, I was told the reason Airbnb didn’t cancel that reservation was that I needed to pay another $430.68 to cancel it. That $430.68 request I gave out was simply the money I wanted to send to them. I almost fainted right there and then. That moment the Airbnb receptionist realized she needed to get someone else to handle this. Then, another agent took over and told me Airbnb cancelled it on their end and the guests were staying at a hotel.
After sending in the paid invoice documenting what has been done by the plumbing company, I haven’t heard back from Airbnb.
I am still in shock and feeling the need of therapy. I don’t know what to write on this guest review.
