Escorts, Hosts rights to refuse entry and keep the booking money

[Matthew---Stay-Central0]

Now we've already had a few escort bookings but we've only found out after (number of used condoms or neighbour complaints). However I've just taken a booking arriving tomorrow and all seemed fine.

The guest called me shortly after booking to check all was ok and arrange check in. all fine and nice girl to speak to. However i noticed when I logged into airbnb to send the check in email that the number she'd called me from was different to the one on the booking. When I googled the number it comes up on a couple of escort websites against the details of a young woman.

So my question is if i refuse entry will Airbnb refund the guest or would (if i challenge the guest and log it via the airbnb message service) have enough evidence to support not letting the guest in? booking is worth £330 and means at the moment if i do cancel the booking I'm almost no chance of refilling for this weekend now.

[Louise0]

What would be your grounds for refusing her entry?  You may not approve of her occupation, but that's not grounds for exclusion and you will not, and should not, be able to do it without being penalised by Airbnb.  If your listing prohibits visitors then you could evict her for breaching that rule when and if she breaches it.

[IRelocate0]

I think your wrong - prostitution and paying for sex is illegal in the UK, if this was booking.com they would immediately side with the host in removing the guest or cancelling the booking and would not ask us to refund the guest. We'd simply need to show evidence that the guest is a prostitute or carrying out activites at the property.

Within our T&C's guests cannot perform any illegal activities such as drug taking, escort/prostitution services, drug dealing etc. So I'm within my rights for our T&C's to not let her stay. but my question is where does Airbnb come down (guest or host) - I will probably call them tomorrow to check.

[Cynthia-and-Chris1]

The guest hasn't done anything illegal in your listing yet, though. If/when she does, THEN you'll have grounds to evict her. Like @Louise0 said, just because you disapprove of her job doesn't mean she shouldn't be allowed to stay. 

[Robin4]

@IRelocate0

Well I would agree with @Louise0! At this stage this person is simply a booking, has not given you indication of any potential wrongdoing.

This person may be 'unpalatable' to you but until she steps over a certain line she is just a guest, and if she does you can legitimately take action to have her removed. But at this stage, sure, you go ahead and cancel, but Louise is right you have no right to expect a penalty free cancellation for something you just think might happen.....

Prostitution may be illegal in the UK but a prostitute eats, lives, catches cabs....and sleeps, and none of these things are illegal.

I would be very disapointed with ABB if they started accepting cancellations based on someones personal thoughts or perceptions!

Cheers.....Rob

[Louise0]

@IRelocate0  Bollocks, prostitution is perfectly legal in the UK.

Seriously, as an Airbnb host I thought you'd be a huge supporter of prostitution, regardless of its legal status.  All this enterprising young lass is doing is sharing an under-utilised asset (her **bleep**), for a fee, on a peer to peer basis and perhaps facilitating the transaction through a platform which shares reviews and builds trust between service provider and client.  It's the epitome of the sharing economy ethos.  All I can say is, you go girl!  🙂

[Annette33]

@Matthew---Stay-Central0 and @IRelocate0 , It's one thing if you have a  guest, even if he/she is an escort, if that person is on her own time and does not engage into escort activities on your property. what that guest does for a living is none of your business as long as it doesn't interfer with your rental. 
It's another thing if that person engages into prostitution on your property.  I should hope that Airbnb would side with you in that case. You already said that it has happened before, and this time you got an escort service phone number. Run that by Airbnb  asap and see what they have to say about it. If I were you, I would be very concerned that apparently your properties are being circulated among the escort people as desirable or easy to book properties for their activities. Best you can do for right now is make tight house rules, install an outside camera to supervise entry to the place and call them on breaking the house rules if there is extra activity and you can prove it.
Unfortunately you are not helping your case by being here twice, first as Matthew, a manager for 8 properties and then also as IRelocate, a manager for 5 properties. Anonymity is what escort people are looking for and that is easy to get with your listings.
You also were wondering about refusing entry but keeeping the booking money: if you are serious about stopping the escort activities, I would think that possibly losing the booking money one time is the lesser of two evils. Good luck in getting it all straightened out!

[Louise0]

It's questionable whether Airbnb would, or even could, 'side' with the host even if the guest does work from the property.  Her work is legal, doing it from a short term rental is legal.  Unless the listing specifically bans visitors or having sex on the premises, what has she done wrong?  It's no different to someone using the flat to, say, interview candidates for a job or conduct interviews for a research project.  

She's probably the ideal guest.  If she's any good at her job, she won't smoke, won't drink more than glass or two of vino, she'll keep the place super clean and tidy and will be far to busy writing up her PhD thesis between clients to even think about doing drugs.  And as long as her services are more GFE than PSE, I'll doubt there'll be much noise to annoy the neighbours 😉

[Jayesh0]

@Matthew---Stay-Central0

Have a friend call the number from one of the websites you found and see if she makes an appointment and gives out your address.  That should be enough grounds for cancellation.

Lisa

[Jean5390]

I am flabbergasted when reading some the above messages. Approving or not approving prostitution is not the question here. But I believe that Airbnb should enforce a clear policy and procedure (if this is not already the case) in order to enable hosts to refuse prostitution taking place on their listings without getting penalized ! This is in the interest of the Airbnb community. If my neighbors – who do not have anything against my renting my flat on Airbnb – find out prostitution is taking place in my building, they will most certainly complain and become hostile to Airbnb. Isn’t it simple common sense ?

On the other hand, I believe that penalizing hosts who would potentially carry out prostitution at a listing by allowing guest to cancel and keep the reservation money is not acceptable.