PSA - Take last-minute bookings? Don't let this happen to you

[Mike-And-Amy2]

We had an infuriating experience (or lack thereof) with AirBnB support last week, and we would hate for it to happen to other hosts. We had a concern about an instant booking that was made for the next day. Because it was less than 24 hours before they were to check in, we were unable to cancel the booking ourselves. We first spoke to the guest about their needs, and when it became more and more apparent that something was wrong, we decided to reach out to AirBnb first thing in the morning to find out what peaceful recourse we had, and hopefully to avoid penalty.

**[Conversation with CS removed in line with Community Center Guidelines]

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We have been hosts on AirBnb for several years now, have two properties, excellent reviews, and in the very few times we have needed to reach out to Support, someone was able to work with us. The last two years, we have been lucky to reach someone who speaks English, and now, would have been lucky to reach someone at all. 

Folks, I DO NOT USE CAPS LIGHTLY. 

IT HAS NOW BEEN A WEEK - 7 DAYS - 168 HOURS. NO ONE HAS REACHED OUT TO US.

If you have an urgent need, and you reach out to Urgent Support, please know...you have reached out to a Unicorn 🦄.

The moral of the story here is: even if you can accommodate last-minute reservations and have saved your Instant Booking settings to only allow verified guests...DON'T. This guest was verified and had one old positive review. Do yourself a favor and change your settings to "Request booking" for anything that is less than 24 hours in the future. Allow your gut to get a vibe for the guest before the booking is solidified so you have the option to decline without penalty. That would have solved our issue before it began, without needing to beg on hands and knees for the AirBnb gods to look down kindly upon you. 

[Sarah977]

@Mike-And-Amy2  I'm sorry about your debacle- there is quite obviously no such thing as urgent support anymore.

This is why I have never used Instant Book and have had a 2 day advance notice since I started hosting over 3 years ago.

[Mike-And-Amy2]

*My apologies towards the end of my rant: we have THREE properties listed on AirBnb. 🙄

[Mike-And-Amy2]

I will NOW add that although AirBnb has STILL made no attempt to reach out to us, they DID find the need to delete the entirety of my post above, though it reveals no personal information and violates no community posting rule, likely because it puts them in a negative light. Needless to say, the way they have handled this is beyond disappointing.

[Lori2227]

I am a newbie to Airbnb but not a newbie to landlording.  Been a landlord for 20years.  I am not sure how long I will be doing this airbnb thing.  I thought it would be something fun to try.  I was wrong.  I have had seven guests so far and two of them have been rude rude rude.  For no particular reason.  I don't like the review system where you as a host have no clue what they are going to say.  Had one check out yesterday.  Poor communication .  Never responded to any messages I sent.  That should have been a red flag.  She left the place in ok condition but on my security cameras outside , I caught her and hubby smoking and they had a cat.  Both are against house rules.  I don't even allow smoking outside as the smokers always flick their butts everywhere.  She left me a review right away.  Me being dumb and new, I left her a nice review and didn't mention the broken house rules.  Well when I read her review, wow was it nasty and full of lies.  Said she found hair everywhere and that the house was run down.  All untrue.  But how do you refute that?  It came as a shock but I have learned a valuable lesson. I will only review once they review me.  I will just have a standard answer/ review for everyone.   I may go back to regular landlording soon.  I never had this much trouble in regular landlording 

[Sarah977]

"It came as a shock but I have learned a valuable lesson. I will only review once they review me. "

You understand that all submitted reviews are published whether you leave a review or not? Not leaving a review for a guest accomplishes nothing. The guest's review will still appear on your profile.

You need to review your guests honestly- if you don't, bad guests just go on to do the same thing to other hosts. I'm sure you would like to be warned of objectionable guests and the only way to do that is if hosts leave honest reviews.

You have the option to respond to a review. With a review like you describe above, you can just say something like "There is no validity to the accusations levied in this review. I maintain the highest standards of cleanliness, as evidenced by my other reviews." (responses to guest reviews appear on your review page, not the guest's, so they should be written with future guests in mind, to correct lies and misrepresentations, not to speak to the guest who left the bad review).

@Lori2227