ABB's policy towards endemic disease is insane

Joy298
Level 10
Sydney, Australia

ABB's policy towards endemic disease is insane

Due to the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, I would hope to cancel a group of upcoming guests from a neighboring province of Wuhan. I know it’s not good. I have never canceled any guests before. But I’m doing home sharing so this really upsets me.

 

However I just called ABB and found their policy towards endemic disease is not practical at all. The rep told me they only counted the Wuhan administrative district as the affected area. Any approaching areas are not counted. Please check the map below, Wuhan administrative district is in irregular shape. Any surrounding areas like Xiaogan, Huanggang and Ezhou are not counted.B3AFAC0D-C33C-470F-9209-452DBECE40BB.jpeg

 

How could they implement the policy so stiffly? I’m really worried now and feel like ABB is put me in danger.

 

Appreciate for any advices!

73 Replies 73

Hi @Bronwen3 

I 100% understand your feeling. I'm sorry for your loss. I have a friend has her calendar back to almost unoccupied for the next 3 months. More than 20 reservations canceled in the last 3 days. She's in Phuket and usually has 90% of guests from China. She is depressed but still understands this is just the cost of doing the business.

We should do our best to cooperate with the Chinese government to control the virus. Sooner the plague ends, faster the travel industry will revive.

I just sent a reply above. I have a piece of legal advice for you. The extenuating circumstances applies only to GUESTS whereas the wording mentions that a “refund” will be issued (to the guest). Nowhere in this policy does it say the refund will come from the host’s payout. Additionally, the HOST cancellation policy (particularly the “strict” one) makes no mention of any extenuating circumstances. The policy (from a hosts perspective) is clear and without clause. ABB does a great job of delineating “hosting” versus “travelling/guest”. I advise you to use this delineated setup back to ABB. 

People, ABB revenue  in 2019 was 4.3 billion, with a 21 percent growth over the year before. They are not suffering and can afford to compensate both host and guest easily.

Branka-and-Silvia0
Level 10
Zagreb, Croatia

oh, I am so happy we are out of season now and can imagine how all of you in Australia and NZ feel

 

@Marko222  you could take a reverse phone number search to discover where your guests are from. For link look at previous comments of Joy

Katrina79
Level 10
Saskatchewan, Canada

@Joy298 I just had a guest who took it upon herself to cancel her upcoming reservation for three. All three were coming from China, one from Beijing. Two of three just found out they have been working with people who visited Wuhan in the past week. Lucky for me this guest approached the issue first as I wouldn’t have known in advance. The guest is very respectful and responsible in my opinion and I will be giving her a full refund. It doesn’t really matter what Airbnb’s policy is, sometimes we hosts and guests have to make the right decisions on our own.

Thank you @Katrina79 for your understanding!

 

The only thing I'm still feeling uncomfortable is that ABB does not have a standard for their service fee. I don't know what is the situation for your guests. I checked with my canceled guests, some have the service fee refunded, but some have the service fee deducted by ABB. How could ABB still make money when both guests and hosts are taking the loss?

WechatIMG1563.jpeg

 

Hosts in China are issuing an open letter to ABB, hoping they will provide some support to hosts after the disaster (service fee exemption for a certain period of time).

ABB gain a reputation that they cooperate promptly and take full social responsibility. They are actually doing kind of marketing while our hosts are paying for the cost. This also happened during the bushfire season. ABB launched their open home project in Australia. However, they have neither reimbursed the hosts who allow victims to stay, nor even claim hosts' contribution for providing substantive help. This is unfair at all.

Katrina79
Level 10
Saskatchewan, Canada

@Joy298 My guest actually cancelled on her own and then was only issued a partial refund. I told her about the extenuating circumstances and sent Airbnb’s phone number for her to call customer support. She didn’t, probably because she thought it would be rude. However I ended up in a call with Airbnb about another guest and had the same case manager look into my guest’s cancellation from China. The case manager was awesome and issued a full refund to her, within minutes I received a grateful message from the cancelled guest. Yes I lost money, Airbnb lost money, but chances are it’ll get rebooked! She was so happy she’ll probably be an Airbnb customer for life, and if/when she decides to come here I’m sure she’ll rebook with me if my place is available. 

Christine-And-Bob0
Level 2
Florida, United States

As a retired Naturopathic Doctor, I would not want to take anyone from China period at this time.  There are now suspected cases in the U.S. in three states.  This is a killer of a virus and you should not have to take anyone from China at all during this time of crisis.  At least that is my feeling.  We are supposed to be able to decline a reservation we are not comfortable with. Well, this makes you very uncomfortable. But if I’m understanding you right,  you are not being refunded?  That’s awful.  I don’t understand why air bnb would not refund all of your money as well as the guests.  

Fiona563
Level 1
Hamilton, New Zealand

I have exactly the same problem! ABB have told me that they will only allow cancellations if the guest is from Hebei (the province that Wuhan is in). I have a guest coming from a place 4 hours drive from Wuhan. I am not happy with this! The disease is spreading all over China so I think ABB should allow cancellations by hosts for the entire country! 

I resorted to asking the guest to cancel, which he did. I feel bad that I had to do this, but if Airbnb won't support hosts, we are left on our own to mitigate risks. Have now switched off Instant Book too.

Robin4
Level 10
Mount Barker, Australia

@Fiona563 

You were given that information 3 hours ago Fiona!

Now that is disgraceful.

In less than 1 week we have gone from 3 confirmed dead and 100 confirmed infected to 80 confirmed dead and 2,700+  confirmed infected and the number is growing exponentially!

 

Admittedly 95% of the deaths are contained to the Hubei province but only 56% of the infected reports have come from that province. Infected people are now all over the world......this is the way infectious diseases like this spread.

Any company or organisation that is withholding information that may inhibit the spread of this disease.....That is disgraceful! 

 

Cheers.......Rob

Rune4
Level 2
Narvik, NO

Asians are travelling the world, also here in the Northern part of Norway, way above the Arctic circle. It is of course good, but should we be more concerned ?

 

In the Airbnb- guidelines it is mentioned a point about endemic disease or illness that suddenly affects a region or an entire group of people. It says that  "This doesn’t include existing diseases that are associated with an area—for example, malaria in Thailand or dengue fever in Hawaii. Any updates to our policy regarding the outbreak of a disease, and the scope of policy application, will be determined based on announcements by the World Health Organization and local authorities."

 

 On the 26th of January WHO’s assessment of the risk of this event did not change since the last risk assessment conducted on 22 January: The conclusion is that it is very high in China, high at the regional level and high at the global level. Yet for some unknown reason on the 26th of January, WHO advises against the application of any restrictions of international traffic based on the information currently available on this event.

 

That is a bit hard to understand becauseas we speak there comes in a number of reports from international media, social media and even on this thread Chinese authorities are grossly underreporting the outbreak and that the virus has the ability to spread before people show signs of being contaminated.

 

We get quite a few visitors from Asia during the winter season in Norway, in particular visitors from China during this period. We have already got the first cancellations due to the outbreak.

 

Shouldn't we as community expect Airbnb to give us guidelines on how we as hosts should behave and cope? Are Airbnb to passive and too late hiding behind the slow  updating from WHO? I haven't seen any official statements from Airbnb yet for our community.. I have today sendt a message to Airbnb about guidlines, but hasn't got any response yet.

 

 Rune,  Norway

Ute42
Level 10
Germany

.

 

Today the biggest german airline „Lufthansa“ has cancelled all their flights to China.

 

This action has been taken for the time being until Feb. 7.

 

 

Alon1
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

  

To date, 16 Airlines (national airlines) have cancelled.

@Ute42

Lizzie
Former Community Manager
Former Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

Hello everyone,

 

An update on the coronavirus and Airbnb's extenuating circumstances policy has just been shared in the Community Center's Help board, here is the direct link: Coronavirus outbreak: Information on Airbnb's extenuating circumstances policy coverage

 

I hope you find this update useful. 

 

Thank you,

Lizzie


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