Guest Lied about Bedbugs and mold and AirBnB REFUNDED him - Help!

Monaco1
Level 3
Atlanta, GA

Guest Lied about Bedbugs and mold and AirBnB REFUNDED him - Help!

Hi everyone

 

I’m super frustrated with AirBnb at this point. I had a guest come Sunday night via Instant booking. He was a first time guest through AirBnb. I should have known this was going to be drama.

 

I met him at the door and did a walkthrough with him of the room. We chatted for 5 minutes about other stuff unrelated to Airbnb and then I went to bed around 1 a.m. that morning ( I work two other jobs and I had a big project due that morning)

 

 

So, I wake up at 4 a.m. in the morning to get ready for job #3 and the guest is gone. I contacted the guest asking what was wrong but it didn’t tell me until 12 hours later that the place wasn’t clean. I asked him what wasn’t clean and what I could do to change the situation but he told me that “everything is dirty”.

 

Finally, three days later, he’s telling me there are bed bugs and mold in the bathroom. I know I don’t have any bedbugs because I have a bedbug trap and I spray bedbug, flea and chigger bug prevention spray on the mattress seams between guests. I also have a bedbug cover on the mattress as well.

 

He sent a picture of the “bug’” It’s literally a piece of lint from the microfiber sheets!

 

Also, the “mold” is the messy paint job from the landlord. The bathroom wall is a chocolate brown color.

 

I told AirBnb I can get a specialist to confirm that I don’t have bugs or mold. But, they won’t hear any of it and gave the man back his money. I’m so upset because I’m being accused of something that isn’t true.

 

What can I do to prevent this from happening and is there a chance I could fight AirBnB to get my money back? I have the bed bug specialist coming today to confirm my status and I’m scheduling the mold specialist now - all at my own time and expense.

 

Super frustrating! 

1 Reply 1
Kath9
Level 10
Albany, Australia

@Monaco1, unfortunately it will be his word against yours and Airbnb almost ALWAYS favours guests. This 'bedbug' scam is becoming more common - guests claiming false things and then getting a refund. However, it is interesting that the guest left the first night - from what I have read in the host forum, guests often stay for their full booking and THEN demand a refund based on spurious claims. It sounds like you go above and beyond the norm to prevent bedbugs so I'm sure this is extremely frustrating for you. Send Airbnb the evidence from the bedbug and mould specialists and I hope you get a good outcome. But you may not.

 

One thing I would recommend is to change your Instant Book settings to only allow guests to instant book that have previous good recommendations from hosts. I also suggest that in your review of the guest you do not recommend them to prevent them Instant Booking with other hosts.