What next? - Refund refused by host after resolution centre request

[John2059]

My experience with changing a date on a booking...

We booked a three day stay at an apartment, but 5 days later requested to change the date to start a day later and staying for 2 nights instead. We made the original booking more than 3 months before our stay and the host had a 30 day free cancellation option.

After the host didnt get back to us for a week or so, following our date change request, we followed up with several more messages and after 6 weeks they responded saying they "had not received the request for a date change, so cannot accept the request" (these were their words). We sent a couple more messages without much help from the host, still staying they had not received the request.

It got a lot closer to the date that we were staying at the apartment, so we messaged AirBnB Help Centre and they said the host should have a message in their inbox with the request (we said this to the host, they still say they haven't received this), we were also told that the host can manually edit the dates and we were sent a link to this. We passed this on the host, but no response. The Help Centre also told us that we can request the one day back as a refund after the stay, so we had to do this.

After no response from the host, we invloved AirBnB and provided the messages of the host written agreement that they were happy to the change the dates and screenshots of our request, date requested etc.

They have now come back to us and said the host has rejected the refund... We have no idea what our next steps are?

We have used AirBnB around the World and never had such a bad experience with a host.

Any help would be greatly apprciated.

Many Thanks,

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@John2059

I don't know the details but maybe your host has a 3 night minimum? 

I have a 3 night minimum so if I were the host I would not allow a change to 2 nights to start with or I'd tell the guest they are free to stay only 2 nights but my minimum is 3 nights. Also, if the host recieved a request from a guest and ignored it, then in such cases the ABB system usually assumes the host has accepted and proceeds from there so I'd be prone to think the host isn't lying about not getting a request for date changes. 

Please understand hosts aren't paid until after the check-in date so the host is actually doing the right thing by not issuing an immediate refund. If the host refunds you now, there is a possibility that ABB will issue another refund later giving you (guest) a double refund. So I would never refund money that I never recieved in the first place and also not until I'm certain ABB won't just take money away from me and give it back to the guest without my permission. The way I see it, the host is just being cautious. 

[John2059]

Hi Jessica & Henry,

Thank you for your quick response and for giving a hosts point of view on this.

The minimum nights stay is a fair point, there was no mininum that I remember. Also, we have it in writing that the host was happy with us changing the dates.

We requested a refund after we had checked-out of the apartment, so assume the host has been paid. The part with the "double refund" sounds confusing to me as I have never hosted or been in this situation. From the response we got from ABB's Resolution Centre sounded as though the host had dismissed our claim and that that was final. Do you know if this is the case or if there are further steps we can take?

Thanks again for your response.

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@John2059

Usually, any refund due is issued to the guest by ABB automatically so a request for refund from the host's point of view is the guest requesting an "additional" refund beyond what is stated in the policy. 

Because ABB is quick to take money but slow to pay it out or issue refunds and due to the time difference of the events, sometimes hosts will accept the request to refund from guests who say they did not get a refund only to find that ABB refunded the guest later "again" making it a double refund to guest. 

Also, agreeing to the change of dates isn't exactly the same thing as agreeing to refund the difference of 1 night. 

I think the best way forward is to contact the host directly and ask about the refund. Good luck~

[John2059]

Thank you for clarrifying and for the advice, that is great.

Hopefully we will get this sorted.

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

[Roberta2]

@John2059

Did you ask for the change via text, or did you go to the app -> choose my trips -> change or cancel -> change date?

If you did as above, the host will get a notification and he has, I believe, 24 hours to respond.

Youc an then escalate to airbnb.

I hope this helps

[John2059]

Hi @Roberta2,

Thank you for your response. Yes we used the app for this, didn't know about the 24 hours to respond bit. As we have already stayed at the apartment we are now requesting a refund. Again, the host did not respond to us so we asked ABB to resolve this issue but now the host has rejected our refund, so we are keen to know what our next steps are. If you have any advice that would be great?

Thanks again