Refund Request

[Vick1021]

We booked a 2 night stay for 6 people totalling over 750 pounds in early March 2022 for November 2022 (9 months away). We were visiting the city and decided to see the Airbnb property before our next visit with our guests and were shocked to realise that the location of the Airbnb was not the same as the original listing. The location was not anywhere near the red house on the listing map (over 15 mins away) and was on the very edge of the red circle if not outside. Normally, we are fairly adaptable people but our party consists of people with mobility issues (disabilities) who cannot deal with the distance and will not be able to use the property they have paid for. Furthermore, the location was the primary reason for why we chose the property. We tried to contact the hosts through Airbnb and have heard nothing back from them in 5 days even though their typical response time is 1-3 hrs (we understand people cannot reply quickly). Their cancellation policy is 48 hours, however, we were entirely mislead with the property and it was 100% false advertising. We would like a full refund since the property was falsely advertised (location) and cannot support the people who have paid to use it. We have contacted them over 8 months in advance. If anyone could advise us on how to proceed, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you! 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Vick1021 It appears the property could well be within the circle shown on Airbnb. If location was so critical to you then you could/should have asked questions before booking it.

[Huma0]

@Vick1021 

@Mike-And-Jane0 could well be correct. The location shown on the listing is approximate and can be quite broad. You cannot show the exact location prior to booking for security reasons, as I am sure you can appreciate. However, once you have booked, you will be supplied with the exact address, which you can look up and cancel within the 48 hours penalty free if you're not happy with it.

If you feel that there was something very misleading other than that, i.e. the location is way outside of the area specified in the wording of the listing (e.g. I have seen listings advertised as Central London when they are actually in Zone 3, have no underground station and are a 45 minute overground journey into Central London), the address given on the booking is not the address where you are staying, that sort of thing.

If the listing is on the very edge of the red circle, well that's not really the host's fault at all because it's the Airbnb system that generates the maps and circles. The host has no control over it at all. It is still not great that the host has still not responded to you in five days, and your booking is so far out that I wouldn't mind if you cancelled, but bear in mind, if they have done nothing wrong (i.e. it was the Airbnb generated map that confused you) and you are expecting them to cancel, they will most likely not want to do it. Hosts face a load of penalties for cancelling guests. They can still agree to issue you some kind of refund, e.g. if the dates get rebooked, but that is at the host's discretion and they can't refund you the Airbnb fees as that is out of their control.

[Vick1021]

The host was nice enough to give us a complete refund since we booked so ahead of time. They were very flexible and understood our predicament. We were super lucky!