Guest Trying to Book House but Airbnb Isn’t Allowing Due to Covid-19 Help

[Colby16]

All, 

I have a neighbor who is trying to book my house for her family that live an hour away for the weekend of March 28th. AirBnb is declining their attempt to book my house or any other in the area. It is saying, “choose another place to stay. As part of our commitment to your safety, certain last-minute bookings of entire homes are restricted right now. You can still book a HOTEL or a private room for your stay”

I am quite confused on why a private room differs from an entire house rental. You still have most of the house during the private room. I had them try to book other houses and gave the same message. We are in Michigan and thought maybe it would be a travel restriction, but nothing.

Has anyone has this issue yet or spoken to customer service about it?

[Rebecca181]

Oh dear. I imagine this scintillating piece of information contributed to Susan's recent banning from the CC as well. Quite tawdry, I must admit, if true. Using a collective human tragedy as a means to funnel customers to a new, flailing business division. Yuk. 

[Donald28]

I was answering susan17. You can't make that assumption or accuse airbnb of cancelling bookings in hopes of diverting the money to an airbnb owned hotel. You'd need some pretty clearcut, obvious proof of that. Just because someone on a forum thinks that's what happening, doesnt make it so. 

[Helen350]

@Donald28 True, we can't know for certain.... just that  @Susan17 has done a tremendous  amount of research into Airbnb's practices over the years.......

[Susan17]

Thank you, @Helen350  :))

@Donald28 

Firstly, nothing I post on the CC about Airbnb is ever based on vague assumptions, or on random stuff someone says on the internet. Over the years, I've built up a solid, trusted network of over 200 hosts, guests, co-hosts, property managers, Airbnb software partners and other related parties, who I'm in regular contact with, and who are based in dozens of different markets worldwide. When anything of note happens in Airbnb-land, I consult with as many of them as I can, to make sure I have as broad and clear an overview as possible of what's happening, where it's happening, why it's happening, how it's happening and who it's happening to (never an easy task, given Airbnb's rank inconsistency and arbitrary methodology and implementation)

So as you can imagine, my phone has been blowing up this entire week with calls, messages, texts, emails, photos and screenshots relating to coronavirus/cancellations/EC issues, and you can rest assured, any information I post has been gleaned from - and verified by - a number of different sources.. then checked, double-checked, and checked yet again. 

Now... just to clarify... at no point did I "accuse airbnb of cancelling bookings in hopes of diverting the money to an airbnb owned hotel". Of course Airbnb aren't just cancelling bookings themselves. What they absolutely are doing however, is emailing guests about "incidents" affecting their hosts' locations (in some instances, even where there are no confirmed coronavirus cases in the region), and pointedly advising them that they're entitled to a full refund, should they wish to cancel. Naturally, the references to "an incident" in the area - be they accurate or not - are spooking some guests into cancelling, when they may not otherwise have done so. So no, Airbnb are not actually cancelling bookings as such, but their somewhat disingenuous terminology inarguably is leading to many unnecessary and unwarranted cancellations. 

And yes, Airbnb absolutely are blocking bookings of entire homes in certain markets - typically, where there's a substantial Hotel Tonight and/or OYO presence - and inviting the guests to book an Airbnb-affiliated hotel instead. 

Unfortunately, I don't currently have the ability to post the relevant screenshots on the CC (as I always do, when posting anything controversial here), but I can tell you now, I have a mountain of clear-cut, irrefutable proof to back up my claims. Believe it. Don't believe it. All the same to me.

[Donald28]

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@Susan17 wrote:

What they absolutely are doing however, is emailing guests about "incidents" affecting their hosts' locations (in some instances, even where there are no confirmed coronavirus cases in the region), and pointedly advising them that they're entitled to a full refund, should they wish to cancel. Naturally, the references to "an incident" in the area - be they accurate or not - are spooking some guests into cancelling, when they may not otherwise have done so.

This is exactly what has happened to 3 of my reservations in the last 1-2 days. An "incident" in my town when we don't even have any cases of the virus here now. However the guests told me they initiated the cancellation... not airbnb. 

[Colleen253]

@Donald28 

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/Guest-Cancellation-Airbnb-emails/td-p/1262604

This has happened with some of my cancellations, too.

@Susan17 

[Susan17]

Sorry @Colleen253 - just came across this now. I don't get notifications when I'm tagged. 

From what I'm seeing now, this is happening on a massive scale, in markets worldwide. 

 Airbnb have been telling some hosts that it's a health & safety thing, and they've been blocking guests from booking regular  listings and redirecting guests to Airbnb-affiliated hotels instead because of coronavirus, which makes zero sense because it would create infinitely less of a public health hazard for singles/couples/groups to be staying together in a stand-alone, self-contained unit, than being shoehorned into a "boutique" hotel, with a bunch of unrelated strangers. 

Then they've also tried to tell other hosts its to stop under 25s renting places for "party houses", which is also bs, because some of the guests it happened to were middle-aged, and some of the listings were tiny studio apartments - hardly high-risk for being turned into a party venues. And besides, Orinda was almost 5 months ago, and this alleged "party prevention" initiative has never once been mentioned before and has only surfaced since they started restricting bookings at regular listings, and warning guests of "incidents affecting the area", and assuring them that they'll receive full refunds if they'd like to cancel. 

It shouldn't really come as any surprise though. They'd already started cannibalising their small host base since they bought French property management company Luckey Homes in December 2018 (now with listings in France, Spain, UK and Canada), and in April of last year, led a $160 million funding round in mega-host Lyric, which had 600 listings in a dozen US cities (but were recently forced to scale back and lay off almost 20% of their staff, due to disappointing performance)

So yeah, between Airbnb actively promoting their hotels and their mega-hosts, and forcing small local hosts to compete for business in the same markets/searches, it makes it next to impossible for us little guys to survive. And somehow, nobody seems to see that as a massive conflict of interest, not to mention a potential breach of anti-competion laws. 

[Susan17]

@Paul1255 

Could you post that "book a hotel instead" screenshot I sent you the other day please P? Still not working for me :((

[Paul1255]

Oh Sorry @Susan17 I have been off the desktop so not getting notifications!

[Huma0]

@Susan17  is this the screenshot you were talking about?

[Rebecca181]

Eeeeew. Truly creepy to see this. 

[Rebecca1711]

Airbnb Party and Events Policy
Reservations associated with higher safety risks are restricted from last-minute booking of entire homes. Currently, we don’t have an option to remove the restriction, regardless of Host authorization. While this may be an inconvenience, you can still explore our hotel rooms.

from Airbnb to my guest trying to book

[Donald28]

This is the message I got when I opened my airbnb experience calendar this morning. Airbnb has not just blocked ("paused" sounds nicer though right?) all new bookings, they are cancelling and refunding current paid experience bookings! I am glad they are NOT doing this with the overnight stays too! 

Experiences paused due to coronavirus (COVID-19)

To protect the health and safety of our community, Airbnb Experiences are paused through April 3, 2020

I had 2 people scheduled for the experience last night... airbnb cancelled and refunded them. They came anyway and paid me via paypal. I was ok with putting airbnbs 20% ($8 per attendee) in my pocket. 

I have 6 people scheduled for next sunday. Airbnb cancelled them too but they are still coming. I'll make an extra $8 x 6 people = $48. 

[Helen350]

@Donald28 Give your machines a bit of a wipe, you'll be fine! Keep calm & carry on, eh? : )

[Donald28]

the guests that came last night actually brought their own clorox wipes and wiped down evey game they played! >;-)