I’ve just had the worst two days as an AirBnB host and am feeling very stressed.
Where to start….I have a couple of houses with Airbnb, both 4 bedroom house shares. I’m currently full.
The drama focuses on one house. Let’s call the guests A, B, C, D.
When guest A moved in he was very friendly and chatty and made me aware he has his own gardening and handyman business. I broke my own rule and offered some work to him at the houses. A few weeks in to the stay and the guest offered to come back after Christmas as a private booking. He was obviously enjoying his stay. He even paid a deposit to hold the room.
Things were going well then until I noticed some pictures from my cleaner. The bathroom looked a bit cluttered. I have house rules which are listed on the description AND emailed to guests prior to check-in. One of which is personal items cannot be left out in the bathroom or kitchen, they must be kept in their assigned kitchen cupboard or the bathroom basket I provide for them to take bathroom items back to their bedrooms. I do this because I used to get bad reviews for the house being untidy.
Guest A’s attitude changed straight away and reported back that he’d asked the other guests and they’re all fine with leaving things out. I stuck to my guns and said no. I then received a complaint from Airbnb – the guest had complained that the dryer wasn’t working. Not one guest had told me this. Guest A was requesting early cancellation and a refund. He also wrote to me threatening a bad review if I didn’t agree. I immediately contacted my appliance insurance company. I showed Airbnb proof of this as well as screen shots of guest A stating he doesn’t want to follow house rules. Airbnb turned down his request.
Now let’s introduce guest B (C and D were already living at the property). Before booking she told me she was a student nurse and asked how busy the house would be. I said it wasn’t very busy but that might change and there could be up to five people in the house but normally there’s four. She said “I appreciate it may be busy.”
Before checking in she requested to reduce her 6 week stay by 1 week saying she had just received her schedule. I stupidly agreed. After checking in she then made a further change request, which was automatically accepted by Airbnb, with a further reduction of several days. The she sent me a third request which would reduce her stay to just 2 weeks. I refused explaining that I don’t normally accept changes and sorry if I gave the wrong impression.
Next thing I know is Airbnb have contacted me, she’s put a complaint into them – the dryer isn’t working. I went through the same process with Airbnb for guest B as I did for guest A. But guest A went a bit further. She then told me she’s working on a high risk ward with COVID patients and would hate to give it to the other guests. A lengthy conversation then ensued with Airbnb about the legalities of her previously withholding this information and what it could mean moving forward. When I questioned the guest as to why they withheld this key information they then denied saying it. It’s in her message! I was getting very frustrated at this point and said if she can’t give me a clear answer as to whether she’s working with infected covid patients then I have a duty of care to check this with her course supervisor as I may or may not need to alert the other guests.
She’s taken this to be harassment and a threat to destroy her career. I’ve reiterated several times I simply want an answer to whether she’s working with covid patients or not and she refused to answer this question.
She put another complaint into Airbnb saying the oven isn’t working (at this point an engineer had been and a replacement part ordered for the dryer). I’ve also bought clothes hangers for each room so guests can dry their clothes. In actual fact it works fine but the setting label has rubbed off the knob so I’m looking for a manual.
In the mean time my cleaners bagged up the mess that was in the bathroom and kitchen. Guest A called me and then wrote to me to complain about this. When I stated again that rules must be followed and will be enforced, Airbnb contact me again to say guest A has further complained that the oven isn’t working. This is the guest that cleaned it himself as part of his handyman business and uses it every day. This is a new case manager who refuses to read the previous correspondence (with both the guest and with AirBnB) on the matter and is saying that if the oven is not working or if the dryer is not working then the guest is entitled to a 50% refund for his entire stay. The guest doesn’t even use the dryer, he has an electric one, which he stated in writing and I’ve sent a picture of this to Airbnb. This case manager is not interested. I’ve requested twice that the case be transferred to a supervisor but he has refused. The case manager for guest B though is very nice and has confirmed I should in fact be able to request a new case manager.
So now I’m on the precipice of Airbnb awarding a 50% discount to a guy who whenever the house rules gets enforced lodges a spurious complaint with Airbnb. And I’ve just received an email asking me to review guest B with no explanation as to whether she’s moved out or not (end date supposed to be Nov 28). Much of this happened in the last two days and has been incredibly stressful.
Throughout all this, and indeed, since they moved in, guests C and D have not reported a single issue to me or Airbnb, except that guest C says guest A complains about the rules often. For peace it would be great to be rid of both guests but their combined payout is nearly £2000.
Can Airbnb really award a 50% refund even if the host can show they have taken immediate action to resolve a problem, especially when the problem was never reported to the host by any guest but came via Airbnb as the result of the host enforcing house rules?
I’ve had a few difficult guests in the past, but never two in the same house at the same time 😞