Carbon Monoxide Detectors for "Work Collection"

[Mark858]

Latest missive from AirBNB
"For the safety of business travelers worldwide, we’ve added carbon monoxide detectors and smoke detectors as required amenities in the Work Collection.

Once you include these amenities, you can update your listing and it will automatically be added to the Work Collection."

Smoke detectors - of course, we all have them, but Carbon Monoxide detectors?  Why oh why make this a compulsary requirement, there is utterly no logic to it. There must be many thousands of motel type studio rooms around the world like ours, where they have no gas inside, no kitchen, external entrance for self check-in, and no possible source of CO buildup. 
Whoever came up with this hair-brained idea must think that all circumstances are like their own experience, eg gas heating, multi unit, shared entrance and the like.
I know over winter, 2/3rds of our guests are traveling for conferences, seminars, workshops or sales. They drive up the drive, take the key from the lock-box, open the ranch slider door, and throw their case on the bed, type int he wife password - unless they are returning, in which case they were connected before they closed their car door. Deal done.

What force a blanket insistence on an utterly irrelevant requirement.

[Terry297]

Thank you for the clarification. That is good to know.  In any case, my condo has no way to produce any substance that a Carbon Monoxide detector would detect. Airbnb did not think this one through!!!  At least for natural gas, they add the distinctive odor that is unmistakable.

I applaud  Airbnb's effort, but this is a case of "they don't know what they don't know".  They should not have rolled out this: 1) with no notice; and 2) before a  review by someone who does understand exactly what a carbon monoxide detector is used for AND in what circumstances it has no value. 

A mere notice would have received immediate feedback (for them to reconsider) and been less embarrassing ..... for making a completely uninformed decision to roll out a ridiculous requirement on all electric properties with no fireplace. 

[Mark858]

I wanted to hit the like button on your post multiple times Terry. You sum it up perfectly, in far less "verbage" than me.

Hah - this thread is the gift that just keeps giving. The carbon monoxide filter I o rdered just arrived. It uses (as I suspect will the cheapo coming from AirBNB ex China) 3 x AA size 1.5 volt batteries.

I am waiting for a reply from the New Zealand Fire Service about policy, legisltion etc pertaining to CO detectors, as SMOKE detectors must in our country by law, be ones of a certain type, AND be made with a non-removable, 10 year lifespan battery.

So if the AirBNB supplied combined Smoke and CO detector is one with removable batteries, it is actually illegal in NZ, and AirBNB by supplying those units into NZ would be breaking the law if they do not have a 10 year, non-removable battery.  The fines for importers are eye-watering.

[Arrianna-And-Graeme0]

It's a very wasteful resource demand.  We have no gas at all in the house so it's completely not necessary.  We have a dedicated work area for working travellers too.  So what does this mean for the rest of Air BnB guests?  That they can just die from gas inhallation because it's not necessary anywhere else but for work collection hosts??  That's so weird.

[Mark858]

Yes, that's the general consensus.

Hey I bought a very cheap CO alarm about $18 delivered, looks like a standard smoke alarm.
If you want to get your work collection status back, legitimately and cheaply, these are in Auckland.

Emax...
https://www.emax.co.nz/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=35_10142&products_id=5367

[Marco1287]

Very good point! There are hundreds of discussions about this but Airbnb is doing nothing. I was expecting a smarter and faster organisation. 

[Christine1596]

Hi, I'm happy to order their free one but we are responsibe for any taxes. Does anyone know if taxes are charged coming into Australia? Also does anyone know if it has to be wired in or can just be battery driven? tThank you.

[Mark858]

Oz has a very generous import exemption for private imports. I think up to AU$800 value just passes straight through -

[Ben551]

Yeah @Christine1596 this is waaaay below the Australian customs duty threshold. Your countries threshold is a whopping AUD $1,000 before any import duty applies. This little device won’t even come close, it’s max $50 worth.

Reference:

https://www.wwcf.com.au/customs/

[Jenny-And-Barry0]

I spoke to Airbnb yesterday about this. They said they are easy buy locally from most hardware stores but check that your smoke detectors have the function first.

Offering free carbon monoxide detectors for properties, which cannot emit CO2’s is a form of plastic pollution and is completely irresponsible. I am a chartered building designer and carbon monoxide regulations vary throughout the UK and are taken extremely seriously.

Under the Building Regulations Approved Document J, for England and Wales, it is mandatory to fit a carbon monoxide alarm “where a new or replacement fixed solid fuel appliance (e.g. wood and coal burning, not gas) is installed in a dwelling”.

Furthermore, under new legislation introduced in October 2015, private residential landlords in England are obliged to fit a carbon monoxide alarm in any room with a solid fuel appliance.

In addition with annual safety checks on each appliance and flue, this aims to ensure tenants are adequately protected against fire and carbon monoxide. Failure to comply with the legislation, and private landlords are susceptible to pay a £5,000 fine.

Our property listed with Airbnb we recently self built and it complied with the Building Regulations and signed off by building control. There are smoke and heat detectors but no carbon monoxide detectors due to the fact that there are no appliances, which can omit CO2’s.

The property is powered by electricity and we are in the process of installing solar panels and batteries. We self built our home and consciously constructed using sustainable building materials and methods as possible. We live in Cornwall (UK) and are surrounded by award winning beaches. We (my family) live in a ‘plastic free’ community and regularly go on community beach cleans to collect washed up plastic off our shorelines. We definitely will not be requesting a free carbon monoxide detector from Airbnb because it will only add to the millions of tons of plastic which may find their way into our oceans let alone the CO2’s produced to manufacture and deliver it here.

We have now taken the conscious decision to remain outside of the ‘Work Collection’ and I am sure we will lose bookings.

Please could hosts who have installed Carbon monoxide detectors (where there is no source of CO2), share with us how many times their detector has activated.

[Manik1]

Total waste of time as this should not be complusory as I live in Melbourne and my properties don't have gas burners or wood fire places etc. The apartment has reverse cycle which works off electricity and the other has Gas ducted heating but the heater outlet is outside and the kitchen exhaust is also ducted out of the roof, so do I really need to spend for something that is totally uncessary? Do these need to be wired like the smoke detectors?

[Marco1287]

It is symply ridiculus that this requirement does not consider the real conditions of the apartment. 

The carbon monoxide alarm is necessary in homes with at least one fuel-burning appliance/heater, attached garage or fireplace. Not in other cases. 

[Michael-and-Jacqui0]

I too have just received this notification from AirBNB.  Clearly they have no understanding of the purpose of a CO monitor, but more importantly, I am really struggling to understand why they have chosen to apply this requirement (misguided as it is) to only business travellers.  The only conclusion I can draw from this is that the lives of our "leisure" travellers are somehow less important!

I would love to hear what AirBNB have to say about their decision.

[Mark858]

Exactly Michael. I just sent them feedback about this (again), when I received my community newsletter.

They are all "waffle", they do not seem to care what people think. They do not respond to community complaints. Just another corporate.