I am accused of "dognapping" in a review by a host. Yep, dognapping. Seriously.
Here's a summary of my story....
The apartment's security camera caught a neighbour's missing dog (which is smaller than a cat) sneaking into the room when I opened the door. Then someone started knocking on the front door repeatedly but I didn't answer due to the host's discretion policy (see below). Meanwhile the host and I exchanged the messages. I asked her advice. She explained the situation, and asked me to let the dog out. Apparently the host got the information from the concierge who was looking for a missing dog.
This host' discretion policy,
"Please do not talk to anybody REGARDING DOING AIRBNB OR Short Term rental - especially the Concierge. If you had to mention anything to anybody, please just say you are staying with a friend!"
Airbnb was aware of her policy but didn't take it as an Airbnb guidance violation.
This dog incident revealed her secretive Airbnb activity of 2.5 years to the property authority, which then forced her to end it.
The host blamed me for her lost business so I couldn't stay there anymore. Next morning I moved to a hotel despite of my payment for 10 days to Airbnb. In fact I stayed on the premises only 40 hours. The following day the host demanded me to pay $400 USD for a key. So I paid it immediately on top of my accommodation to avoid the confrontation with her. But the pyment didn't stop her. She continued to demand returning the key. Eventually Airbnb intervene and recommended me to block her.
Then, the angry host wrote an angry review, "dognapping" allegation.
"xxxx stole another resident's dog and brought it to my place. She refused to return the dog......."
The following is a part of the Airbnb review guidance as to what is not allowed.
Reviews:
"Reviews that do not represent the author’s personal experience or that of their travel companions"
I sent Airbnb my message exchange with the host during the incident, and requested that they delete this false criminal offence accusation from my profile. Because it clearly does not represent the host's “personal experience."
To my great surprise, a case manager refused my request. Then I offered to submit further evidence, the testimonies of the dog owner and the concierge.
Again, he refused my offer of testimony and my request to delete the false, defamatory review.
"Please understand that we are in no position to stand against anyone's opinion about the incident where it is true or not, we only remove a review in rare cases that our content policy is violated which is not for this review."
The review's authenticity is shown to be false by the author's own words, which are in the Airbnb message record.
How it can be "the author's personal experience"?
Can someone explain what's wrong with Airbnb?
