I have been a host for over 8 years and just experienced a new scam. I had a guest that claimed he was coming from Vietnam, although his profile is an actor from Los Angeles, and kept on with inconsistencies in his story. He was traveling all the way to Panama for 2 days? He had a problem with Qatar Airlines canceling his ticket due to credit card user not accepting the charge, then booked another ticket with new arrival date, then someone missed the flight out of their group so they all rebooked their flights. He wanted a credit if he could book a couple of days later and extend the stay for 8 days. At this point i still believed him and said I would work with him on getting the days refunded after I returned from my vacation the next day. The day he was supposed to arrive ( now saying he was arriving from Soa Paulo) he booked a transport from the airport, but after 4 hours the transport company left as it was a "no show". 19 hours later he texted me and said he wasn't able to enter Panama due to immigration refusing their entrance even though he was a US citizen??? Now he is requesting Airbnb to encourage me refund his money since it was out of his control. I have read that they are using fraudulent credit cards and then getting the money back. Not sure how that works... but?? I contacted Airbnb a couple of times to report what was happening. and I felt like i was the one in that was doing something wrong by not believing the guest! The agent's English was very difficult to understand and at the end of the conversation he said, OK, so you want to refund the guest! I had said several times that it was a scam and I was NOT refunding the money because this guests has cost me money in losing out on a real renter, cleaning and management fees waiting for his arrival to get ready and to reimburse the transport company. I was very upset with the lack of "support" from Airbnb and their accusatory attitude.
