Case manager gave refund without my approval

David59
Level 2
Cashmere, WA

Case manager gave refund without my approval

I have a case manager Acel who refunded my potential guest their full amount for an issue that was not my fault. They claimed they came to a road gate with two locks and could not get past it to get to my guest room. There is no gate. There are no locks on this fictitious gate. The problem I have is that I am a Superhost with over 100 guest reviews and probably 150 guest stays. My communication rating is 4.9 out of 5. And Airbnb stats state that my last 29 ratings for communication is 5 stars. 

 

I have emailed Airbnb case manager Acel telling her there is no gate. I told her there is no review private/public that complains about or mentions a gate. My directions have not been modified and no where does it say..."hey...by the way, pass the GATE on your way to get here". 

 

Now since the case manager Acel apparently wants to believe the potential guest over me, I said ok, fine, ask any random past guest of mine if they had to pass any sort of gate to get their guest room here. Choose any one you'd like. I said even choose the current guest who has stayed here for 3 nights in a row. 

 

The frustrating thing is these case managers apparently do not have a supervisor to speak to. Because any one with any experience who looks at my status as a superhost, my communication ratings, and my overall ratings...the number of them and what I have been rated, would come to the conclusion that I as a superhost am not lying to Airbnb.

 

Also, what would be my motive? I want the revenue from these guests. That's the whole point of airbnb!

 

They need someone with more experience above the case managers to appeal these decisions. 

23 Replies 23

It sounds like they got lost, which is totally on them. Did they try to reach you? We called recently about a third-party booking and having their account removed and the person handled it really well, but when we first flagged it and emailed the person was not helpful at all.

 

We are hearing more and more than there really is no set standard. It depends on who you get assigned to your case and so many other factors. I did see another host asked for their case to be escalated to a manager and got somewhere with that.

Hi Todd, 

 

They sent a message at 12:47am in the morning stating: "You didn't say there was a gate". That's it. No phone call to me. No request to guide them into my place. BTW my check in time is listed at 3pm- midnight..12:47am is outside of that time. That said, if I received a phone call asking for me to help guide them...I would have. I should also mention my AIrbnb is located near a Bavarian/German styled town and the weekend they were here was Octoberfest. They stated they were going to meet up with friends for Octoberfest. People, in general, drink beer heavily during Octoberfest. So my theory is they were a couple who closed this festival down, drove up here inebriated, got lost, and decided to crash with their friends instead. Just a theory.

Sheri29
Level 2
Marquette, MI

I think the case manager should have investigated with you prior to making a decision.

That's the thing. She apparently was contacted the following afternoon and gave me 30 minutes to respond. Which I did not do. I hadn't thought they weren't here because the only note they sent me at 12:47am was: "you didn't say there was a gate". Since I hadn't heard from them the rest of the night or that morning (again, no phone call), I assumed they figured it out. 

Denny20
Level 2
Los Angeles, CA

Have you tried to ask for a different case manager? I had a guest lately that tried to get a refund by going around my house and taking pictures of random things that look dusty and send them to Airbnb. I told the guest numerous times that I would clean anything if they just asked me. This was the only guest that did this and my house isn't dirty at all! I sweep the house every other day! Turns out that guest was trying to run a scam. I don't know how many times the person tried to do that but I called up Airbnb super pissed and pleased my case and that guest walked away with $0. That guest you probably had might of been a scammer as well! I hope you left that person a very detailed review!

Grace169
Level 1
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

I am very new to list in this BnB.. apparently those whom booked ,questions asked appears to be scammer..as they keep asking questions like have a friend stay in the same building and want to arrange to meet and view first.. and one of them the date is like next few hours or tmr will want to stay..but never reply my questions follow by.. n never appear as well.. dont know how this BnB works.. and how to communicate in this platform..

 

I have discovered with the past 2 issues that I've had with guests is that if you send pics to Airbnb it is helpful. My issues were immediately escalated to a case manager and I received money from the guest.

Just a suggestion.

Good luck!

Julie and Dan

@David59    Try Twitter and FB and call again and insist on speaking to a supervisor it has worked wonders for me even when I have been told the case is closed. Search posts about refunds, there is a post click here where the guests were refunded for a bogus claim – because the host did not give up Airbnb eventually paid them even though they had already returned the money to the guest.

Ale53
Level 2
Federal District, Mexico

I had a situation like this. It was a girl that told me she was going to arrive around 5pm.

At 5pm I wrote her through airbnb and asked for her phone number as the one on airbnb wasnt connecting.

She never replied until hours later saying "I will have to cancel this reservation as I have been traveling for hours and this place seems very far" (even though in the description it says the name of the neighborhood!)

And she even had the guts to review me -i got the notification next morning- well... I knew it wasnt going to be a good one. I called AirBnB and they told me that it was a negative review, so they cancelled the reservation and I didnt get ANYthing from this reservation and the girl didnt het any penalty either!

They (airbnb) just don't seem to understand well the CANCELLATION POLICIES. 😞

 

Vinny3
Level 1
Pensacola Beach, FL

I'm very displeased with the way Airbnb handles cancellations by people renting. I believe that the refund policy should be enforced no matter what is occurring. As this is a business for most people and really without people hosting, Airbnb would be nothing. Weather, acts of God are out of people control and should not be the responsibility of the people who are hosting who are trying to make a living. Most people are willing to work with people but Airbnb takes upon themselves and refunds people 100% even when the storm doesn't affect that area and when the person renting knows that they're going to lose part of their money it's not Airbnb's place to take money that is coming to that person hosting. Airbnb should not be allowed to do this and should definitely consult with the hosting person and find out exactly what's going on. I will definitely talk to other Airbnb and express my opinion.
I hope Airbnb smart enough to consider my opinion and can come to some common ground.

I have to agree. Now maybe I'm biased because airbnb determined I am a "superhost". But I can understand them trusting a guest more if say a new airbnb host has only 3 stays at their place and something goes wrong. But at some point of number of stays and if you reach "superhost" status, then the burden of proof should be heavily on the guest, not the host. Because that means X number of guests have rated your rental highly with minimal or no complaint. So if a guest is way outside the norm of that it really should be looked at by a case manager as to why that is vs. what they do now: an almost automatic..."the guest is always right...forget the cancellation policy...the superhost loses all revenue". 

@David59  "I can understand them trusting a guest more if say a new airbnb host has only 3 stays at their place"  

Why?  That makes no sense to me. And what if the 3 stays have all been 5 stars for the host and the guest is new?

The only fair and transparent thing to do is for both sides to have their say.

 

Well Ange to take it to an extreme...let's say a guest has 20 stays at 20 different AirBNB's and great reviews from all those hosts. And then there is a new host with a new Airbnb with 3 stays and this 20 stay guest is the 4th stay and the guest has a bad experience. If I were a case manager, I would have to weigh in the guest's 20 flawless reviews vs. the new host. 

 

But in my case, I have over 100 reviews and am a Superhost. And the guest who had an issue has been only to one airbnb stay (albeit it was a good review).  And obviously I would leave a poor review for communication if I were allowed. My point is I have over 100 guests from different points of view of life/multiple countries staying here, and I am imploring the airbnb case manager to ask any single one of them about a gate or locked gate. And this case could be solved in one minute or less. Instead, they are so far siding with the guest with the one airbnb stay.

 

That seems blatantly biased, wrong and unethical to make decisions in such a manner. I have two different guests this weekend. They can contact them as well. Instead AirBNB would rather drag this on and on and on instead of solving it with one phone call to any past or current guest since aparently they do not believe my statement. 

 

-David

 

 

@David59   I totally agree with you about the bias just not the way to resolve it.

– ask Airbnb if the guest sent evidence of the 'imaginary locked gate' (as per Airbnb policy for claimimg refunds) because you have 100 witnesses that will swear on oath they never saw it.  Keep at them: Twitter, FB, phone calls. Good luck.