Host Cancellations That Leave Guest Without a Place to Stay

[Karen457]

I've been using Airbnb for quite a while, and often, as I'm a travel writer. I booked a home in Newfoundland months in advance - back in January, as there are very few options in this area and they book quickly in the summer. In fact, even by January there wasn't a lot left for June. This morning, the host suddenly cancelled with no explanation - just unexpected circumstances. There is nothing left available in this town and we have a tour booked from here too. It could potentially throw the entire trip off. I'm not sure at this point what we're doing - the people we're doing the tour with are checking for us as everything online is booked. I asked the host for recommendations and he never responded. As we won't be staying with him, I can't leave a review - but this was really awful treatment, especially considering he's left us in the lurch. It also makes me wonder, what happens if a host cancels at the very last minute? We'd be stuck sleeping in the car! 

What is the policy at Airbnb for this, and is there anyway to leave a review or some feedback for the host so that this doesn't happen to others? I'm not finding anything on this nor a good contact for Airbnb. The Airbnb contact us option eventually opens to chat, which goes nowhere. It sits "waiting for agent" without actually going somewhere, ever....left it open for hours.

[Helen3]

Hello

Contacts for Airbnb are at the top of the forum you are posting in 🙂

Airbnb should give you a discount voucher towards a new booking.

Your host should have been more helpful. Have you actually had the cancellation confirmation come through.

Give Airbnb a call and see if they can help you with finding a suitable alternative.

Good luck.

[Karen457]

Weird, I don't have any contact options on the top of the page coming up, only the Community Center. Went to contact us, finally got to the option to actually contact someone but it was only chat - the chat didn't work. It said, "wait for an agent," left it up for hours, no one came in nor did another message pop up.

Went to the Facebook page and someone replied with a contact page that said link didn't exist. I did find the number so going to try that, thanks for your help!

[Scott80]

It has been my experience the phone works the best for time sensitive communication with AirBnB.

[Karen457]

Thanks Scott, I did find that, calling Airbnb now 🙂

[Scott80]

Sorry I was too quick to post and did not read your entire post before responding. Good luck and please post an update, sounds like you are in for an adventure, whether you wanted one or not 🙂

[Karen457]

Thank you, and that's for sure 🙂 The people are so wonderful there, I'm hoping someone will come through. 

[Karen457]

Hey Scott, Got a response from Airbnb, basically, it's too bad. They don't show anything else available and they recommended that I check other platforms. In the future I'm definitely not booking anything in a remote area with Airbnb that could leave me in this situation again. Holding out hope for one possibility in the area that I found through a local in the area, the owner is out of town until tonight but the person thinks it's available. It's a lot more expensive but definitely better nothing. Crossing fingers it will work out.

[Helen3]

Hi @Karen457

I am not sure why this is not coming up for you https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Community-Help/Contact-Airbnb-A-Community-Help-Guide/m-p/16589#M...

[Scott80]

AND hence the biggest weakness of AirBnB and other peer-to-peer platforms. Since the platforms want to entice people to join, they make it easy to join and to leave. There is not much the platforms can really do to penilize people other than kick them out, because if they started suing people for specific performance, people would just not join and would you really want to stay with someone who wants to quit but doesn't due the the threat of fines or lawsuits?

If you have searched the area and there is truly nothing else available there is not much you, AirBnB or anyone else can do, other than offer you a refund. You can try calling AirBnB at the phone number on your confirmation because they have access to snoozed and listings that are not booked but are marked unavailable and they can contact those hosts to see if they can accomidate you. 

Of course you can widen your search area, search other platforms, hotels etc, even try long-term apartments in the area, if you REALLY want to stay ie: make them a generious offer, an entreprueneral landlord might rent short term.

According to some of the Websites that collect negitive reviews of AIrBnB, sleeping in the car after a last-minute cancellation does happen. But you have to keep in mind that those cases are very rare and there are also stories of other accomidations that cancel last minute, eg hotels with disasters, foreclosure, etc and if there are truly no other places to stay there is not much anyone can do in those cases other than offer a refund.

[Karen457]

Thanks for your reply, I definitely get that. Of course, I did widen my search, checking all options - this is just a very remote area, it's in Newfoundland, Canada in a small but popular tourist town with only a handful of places to stay. St. John's is the nearest actual city, 3 hours away. There are no hotels, just a couple of B&Bs, one small cabin property and perhaps 10 or so vacation homes. You have to book very far in advance to get anything - when I booked in January everything was nearly already sold out. I've got people there I've stayed with before that are looking, they are already sold out and have been for months.

[Tania-and-Andrew0]

In addition to what you've already been told; rest assured you DID left a review. By now the guest should have a horrible message saying "Host cancelled the booking X days before guests' arrival" or something similar. The host was severely punished and if he/she does this often then upon trying to book his/her place guests will receive a warning saying "you are in danger" or something similar to let guests know that this guest cancels bookings.

I hope you find somewhere to stay, have you tried wimdu?

Regards

[Karen457]

Thanks for the info - there isn't anything at all in Newfoundland, even in the capital city, with wimdu unfortunately.