In a New Orleans Polarized by STR, changes to Airbnb bookings and Customer Service isolate hosts

Martin29
Level 2
New Orleans, LA

In a New Orleans Polarized by STR, changes to Airbnb bookings and Customer Service isolate hosts

I am a Superhost, a proud New Orleanian who believes in affordable housing for all, and a host whom has opened my home to guests from around the world for over three years and six months now. Baring a few ups and downs with some inconsiderate guests, usually over fess seasons, my experience with Airbnb has been more sweet than sour, and through it all Airbnb's Customer care was there to help me navigate the good as well as the bad. So why is Airbnb nowhere to be found these days? While the last six months have been the most contentious in terms of our city's experience with STR, and hosts find themeselves having to justify themselves to total strangers abuot how to dispose of their homes while their neighbours are happy with the status quo, Airbnb corporate and web updates have isolated hosts and I find myself beggining to question whether it is worth my while to host anymore.

 

I should say that my shift in attitude has not come lightly or without considering the years of healthy partnership I have had with Airbnb. I have been on the phone and emaling Airbnb since Ocober 2nd, with Devon, Kim (whom I've been waiting to get back in touch with me since October 9th), Elvin, and at least four more other people over the phone about the same matter. Where once I spoke to a single person and usually had problems resovled in no more tham 72 hours, its been four days short of two months since I have asked for help and in that time I have spoken to around 10 people and the matter is still unresolved. I now find myself in the situation where I'm going to have to cancel someone's reservation over Christmas through no fault of their own or mine and I am considering caneceling all future reservations - unwilling to continue hosting with this new Airbnb. I am asking - please - one last time - for Airbnb's help in resolving this matter.

 

When Airbnb changed their web site options several months ago, they must have also changed the staffing around customer care because both of them seem steps back from a system that worked and was flexible for hosts and guests. The last time I updated my calander, I chose the weeks I wanted to issue special prices and minimum days for my guests stays. I was preparing for Mardi Gras, Jazz Fest, and for all those holidays that don't fall on set weeks but odd days here and there, some starting mid-week others on weekends. Like the rest of life's unpradictable events, no fess lasts as long as the next or starts on a Monday. I try to change my prices only for active fess days and I have never issued weekly or monthly discounts because I keep my regular prices low and raise them for fesses to help pay my insurance and taxes on the house only. This is the bulk of my scheduling and I do it for the whole year and make my calander available to guests six months ahead of time. It's been like this for three years now.

 

Amongst several changed I am aware of, Airbnb now does not allow you to pick the start date and end date of special pricing but rather only lets you choose the weeks, say from Monday 1st to Friday 7th, etc.... This means if you have a festival that begins on Thursday, you cannot choose to keep your rate constant till that date but rather are forced to also increase the rates for the days leading up to it since Monday - if you choose to use the specialpricing section rather than setting specific days on a calendar at higher prices. The special pricing option is crucial for festival pricing because it allows you - say - to require a minimum two or three day stay for special events whereas you can set the rest of your calendar to a one day stay minimum. Meanwhile changing prices on the calendar is more flexible but it does not allow you to specify minimum day stay changes but forces you to a standard for the whole year, even across special events where you want people to have to stay more than one night. This constraint seems unreasonable since it takes away from a host's ability to tailor their calendar and overall creates incentive to have more days at special pricing rather than the original tailor-fit system that created incentives to increase the prices only on those days you needed to.

 

We now host in a system where the change has already occurred. In the process I have found that several of my special dates have not transferred to the new system so I have had more than one reservation request I had to decline because the price was listed incorrectly through no fault of my prospective guest or myself. No warning about said changes was sent either, so there was no way for me to correct it once the change had been made. In addition to this mistake, my listing was automatically set to have a weekly and monthly discount - ones I have stated previously, I never wanted to set and I never would want to. I want to keep my prices affordable to all but continue to use the fess season to help pay my insurance and taxes.

 

Previous to the changes too I found the customer service representatives were responsive to a caller's needs and tailored their answers to the problem at hand. These days Airbnb seems to have fallen into the pattern of larger corporations that have people running through scripts that have nothing to do with the problem at hand. Furthermore, after being on the phone with half a dozen people over the same issue I do not want someone repeating to me what the problem is by chronologically stating the facts. It is tedious and honestly insulting. I have contacted you a dozen times and have been present for each call so why would I want you to start answering my specific question with a general recap of the fact that I have been trying to get a matter resolved for two months? Furthermore repeating to me that you are resolving the matter every other sentence does not in fact mean you have resolved the matter. Sending me an email to confirm that you were helping me when you failed to resolve the matter also does not mean that you resolved the matter. If I call and the problem is not fixed you telling me its fixed does not make it so. This of course is not the representative's fault, they do as they are told, but it seems that the more time I host with Airbnb and I have kept my Superhost status, the more tailored and attentive the service should be, and yet I find the opposite to be true. I convinced three neighbours to join Airbnb because I raved about it's attentive nature and now I find myself urging people to strongly reconsider hosting and share my story.

 

I realize this message is wordy and a bit elongated, but I wanted to make clear how much I regret being in this position and how much I miss the old days of Airbnb where the quality of the booking and customer service made it pleasurable for me to host and now I am considering leaving Aribnb altogether. I blame Airbnb for this and I am not willing to put up with it. I am forced to use a local public utility company that has scandalously poor customer service and ignores its clients/citizens because I have no choice; I am willing to put up with bad customer service from a large company like Home Depot because the alternatives are similar and any quality has been snuffed out by mass production and the almost complete elimination of small mom and pop stores where people knew what they were selling; I am however not willing to continue to let people into my home using a service which has begun to care little about the host and is capable of letting me wait for two months for a call back, leaving a simple matter that could benifit hosts, guest,s and Airbnb alike, with a minimal effort . I wish Airbnb would reconsider avoiding my messages and contact me to resolve the matter, otherwise I simply dont feel comfortable enough letting a middle-man coordinate people sleeping and living in my personal space if they are simply not willing to just pick up a keyboard or phone and contact me to resolve a booking issue as promised. I am very disapointed in Airbnb and wish it would not have come to this.

 

After trying several times to contact Airbnb I now invite Airbnb to contact me. Certainly they must care about their hosts. If they contact me in 48 hours, I'll keep the reservation in question. If they contact me in 72 huors I'll keep all remaining reservations. If they contact me in a week I'll continue hosting. I'm tired of reaching out to Airbnb to no avail  so I invite Airbnb to reach out to me. I hope this is all a misunderstanding but am afraid this may very well be the end of what was - for a while - a healthy and prosperous realtionship.

 

2 Replies 2
Randolph1
Level 3
Tacoma, WA

just wondering is AIRBNB your only short tern rental site?? your may need to use other sites.along with AIRBNB..  which may help you meet your needs... just saying

Branka-and-Silvia0
Level 10
Zagreb, Croatia

@Martin29

I am not sure I understood your problem well but. you can go to your calender, select the festive day-s , adjust the price and add rule sets  (min stay, check in/out days etc...) and this is what we are doing.

 

For example you can set 1 day min stay and 50$ base price throughout the whole year ..... and then add rule sets for New year eve - 5 days min stay and 200$ price.

For example:

select all days beween Saturday  and Wednesday and add this rules:

saturday , sunday, monday  - min stay 5 nights, check in /out not possible , price $50

thursday (NYeve)- min stay 5 nights, check in /out not possible - , price $200 (set the price separately)

wednesday.- min stay 5 nights, check in /out not possible -  price $50

 

so you can get bookings longer then 5 nights but not shorter and you will not have any guests coming or leaving during this period