Smoking isn't "damage" and there is no such thing as a deposit. Oh and your house rules mean nothing

Amy-and-Brian0
Level 10
Orlando, FL

Smoking isn't "damage" and there is no such thing as a deposit. Oh and your house rules mean nothing

After weeks of back n forth with "Support" on an open Resolution Center ticket about someone smoking cigars in our condo, where we had to replace the air filter on the A/C, buy those anti-smoke air fresheners, clean all the sheets twice (because they smoked in bed of course), we were denied an extra cleaning fee with this reason:
"I noticed that you are requesting compensation over a smoking fee, please note that we can only compensate for physical damages, as a third-party not present during the reservation, we can't charge the guest for non-physical damages, because there is no evidence that the event has caused lasting damage."

 

So your house rules about no smoking that people must agree to?

Worthless. Smoke up Johnny! AirBnB don't care.

 

And your "Security Deposit"?

Yeah, that doesn't exist because a "third party" is deciding what's damage.

 

But the IPO is coming up, so that's nice.

 

44 Replies 44
Mike-And-Jane0
Level 10
England, United Kingdom

@Amy-and-Brian0 It's worse than that - There is no security deposit taken- its a myth - they just have authority to charge a card that the guest can cancel.

@Mike-And-Jane0 I don't even think they have the authority to charge the card. How many stories have you read where a guest was irate because Airbnb charged their credit card for a set of ruin sheets after their stay? I haven't heard a single one. 

www.airbnb.co.uk/help/article/140/how-does-airbnb-handle-security-deposits

 

@Emilia42 Indeed you are correct. For Airbnb required security deposits they do put a hold on a card, For host required deposits they don't.

Its even more of a joke than I realised.

Colleen253
Level 10
Alberta, Canada

Funny, @Catherine-Powell brought up the new 'guest reliability standards' in one of the latest updates.

 

"In response to ongoing host feedback, we’re adding five new criteria to our guest reliability standards to address late checkouts, unauthorized pets, removal of approved security devices, and other issues."

 

Couldn't help but notice that of course, Airbnb instituting an ACTUAL DAMAGE DEPOSIT is not mentioned as part of the new standards. The breeding of bad guest behavior by Airbnb will continue until there are real consequences for guests. Nothing will, in reality, change. See the standards here:

 

https://www.airbnb.ca/help/article/2894/guest-reliability-standards

 

Right at the top of the page: 

 

 ...guests who stay in listings on Airbnb must meet the following guest standards:

  • Respect listings
  • Respect hosts’ rules

Set that against the backdrop of this post, yet another one of many you'll find on this forum. "So your house rules about no smoking that people must agree to? Worthless. Smoke up Johnny! AirBnB don't care.Indeed

 

So sorry you've had to deal with this type of guest behavior, @Amy-and-Brian0, and that Airbn still does not hold guests accountable for it.

 

 

Ian-And-Anne-Marie0
Level 10
Kendal, United Kingdom

@Colleen253 

 

...guests who stay in listings on Airbnb must meet the following guest standards:

  • Respect listings
  • Respect hosts’ rules

They stopped too soon. Where is the " Otherwise, you will be held responsible to the penalties clearly stipulated in the host's House Rules and which constitute a binding contract" part??

 

Indeed. Accountability is severely lacking.

Sarah977
Level 10
Sayulita, Mexico

While guests should certainly be held responsible for causing damage, and while I detest Airbnb's attitude towards hosts, I can sort of understand this. Most hosts would have no reason to lie, but not following house rules, unless you have the infraction documented on camera, is really just the host's word against the guest's. How can it be prove?

 

Hosts get upset when Airbnb accepts a guest's version of things over a host's, so why should we think it's okay to accept a host's version over a guest's? 

 

The bottom line is that hosts are responsible for enforcing adherence to their house rules- no one in a call center on the other side of the world can do this for you.

 

@Amy-and-Brian0

@Sarah977 They left cigar butts all over the unit. Here's a picture of one that was sent to the renter within minutes of them leaving.
cigarbutt.png
Oh and here's another one, their cocaine straw and baggie we had to deal with, also sent to them within minutes of them checking out.

cokestraw.png

 

Sarah977
Level 10
Sayulita, Mexico

I'm not by any means saying the guests didn't disrespectfully ignore your house rules. I'm saying that Airbnb doesn't have any way of enforcing your house rules, only you do.

 

Airbnb has ever paid out anything to hosts or charged guests for not respecting house rules. And cigar butts on the floor and drug paraphernalia isn't damage.

 

As for the cocaine straw and empty baggie, I don't quite understand why you think of it as "something we had to deal with". It doesn't seem any different to me than any other bits of garbage a guest might leave strewn around- it just gets collected and thrown away. I can understand not wanting to have drug users in your home,  but that's a separate issue.

The fact remains, Airbnb does NOTHING to hold guests accountable, and this type of outcome is what breeds this type of guest behavior. Nothing will ever change without SOME sort of consequence for a guest who does this. 

 

And someone smoking cigars in a house leaves lasting damage in the form of tobacco smell, which permeates every single fiber of the house and it's contents. There is a cost to remediating that. What @Amy-and-Brian0  have done already likely isn't going to be enough.

 

@Sarah977  @Amy-and-Brian0 

 

 

 

 

Agreed, it's awful that Airbnb doesn't hold guests to account and certainly encourages guests to disregard a host's rules, since they can just get away with it. And I also know how hard, costly, and time consuming it can be to remove the smell of someone having smoked repeatedly indoors. I'm not saying it isn't damage, I'm saying it isn't provable damage as far as how Airbnb looks at it.

 

I'm only speaking here to the reality of what hosts can expect from Airbnb, and that hosts need to find ways of preventing or calling a halt to these kinds of behavior, in the absence of not being supported by the company, not how Airbnb should be handling this kind of disrespect. 

 

Which isn't to say we shouldn't keep calling out this terrible attitude and treatment towards hosts and pressuring Airbnb to adjust their bad attitude and policies.

@Colleen253

@Sarah977 

 

Airbnb has ever paid out anything to hosts or charged guests for not respecting house rules

 

That really needs to change. 

The House Rules form part of the Host/Guest contract and there needs to be workable penalties in place to ensure they are adhered to. Pandering to guests abuse does nothing to improve those guests’ behaviour - it’s about time this was addressed otherwise what use are House Rules and how far does abuse need to be taken before AirBnb clamp down on it?

 

Smoking this week - shooting next week. Hosts do not provide their homes with a Carte Blanche license and it is AirBnb who need to realise this and provide a workable solution.

@Sarah977 - you're kidding right? Even the tiniest bit of fentanyl can kill you. Who knows what was in that baggie. And the baggie was only the kicker. The cigar stink in the bedding, the couches, the carpet along with the ashes and butts everywhere was what we were asking for an extra cleaning fee for. 

Look, hotels get $200+ for smoking in a non-smoking room. We can't even get an extra $75 cleaning fee?
We have to change the air conditioner filter, clean everything twice, buy air fresheners, etc. etc.

Gimme a break.

@Amy-and-Brian0  I didn't say I wouldn't consider someone smoking in the house not to be damage, or that you shouldn't consider it to be damage. I said that Airbnb doesn't seem to consider it as damage, although I know some hosts have managed to get paid for extra cleaning, etc due to smoking, But I've read far more posts from hosts saying their claim for this was denied.

 

As far as the drug baggie is concerned, what I meant was that wouldn't you put on some gloves to gather up other people's garbage anyway? I wouldn't want to touch someone's used tissues dropped by the bed (which for all I know could be covered in COVID, aside from the yuck factor) with my bare hands, any more than I'd touch some baggie that contained an unknown, possibly dangerous substance.

Katie415
Level 2
Burbank, CA

Yes, I’ve had the exact same experience. To add to this, if Airbnb can’t contact that guest then Airbnb says they aren’t able to charge the guest for violating any of the house rules because the guest didn’t consent to it. Well obviously the guest won’t consent to any additional charges... Absolutely unacceptable.