How do you file a complaint against a host?

[Tammy37]

Had a confirmed booking, had already paid, then the host said he wanted $100 in cash on arrival as a surcharge.  We disagreed, but eventually cancelled, since we knew he would eventually cancel us out so he could gouge someone else.  

Because we cancelled, we have to eat the service charge.

Two questions:

1) how do we file a complaint against this host?

2) How can we petition to get the host to eat the service charge?

thanks,

Tammy

[Michael-and-Oksana0]

Tammy, I am sure you have learned this by now, don't waste your time. Air BnB has no intention of supporting its customers. They have no interest in your complaint at all. Air BnB's customer service is a joke. A complete joke.  I recently lodged a complaint about a Host who flat out lied in a review. I provided the information and the clause in the Air Bnb 'terms of service' for hosts that had been breached by the host. Air BnB does not care if hosts lie. they do not care about you being put out by any of their mistakes or actions (lies and deciet by hosts) they just care about collecting your money. The faux 'customer service' is so that they can defend their position of 'providing support'. their actions or lack of action on so many issues, complaints and mistakes shows they are not interested.

Best of luck bbut I think, like the resst of us you are flogging a dead horse.

M 

[Sarah977]

@Michael-and-Oksana0  You're quite correct about the abyssmal policies and atrocious customer service, but that isn't limited to guest complaints- it's their across the board M.O. They actually deal with hosts exactly the same way- refuse to remove guest reviews full of lies, contravene their own terms of service, close cases before an acceptable resolution, penalize hosts for declining a booking request from a guest who has nothing but terrible reviews or who sends them inappropriate messages. 

Let's not pit hosts against guests or vice-versa- the blame for unhappy users who can't get a legimate complaint dealt with responsibly rests solely with their inconsistent and poor customer service which doesn't look at individual cases in any sort of depth.

[Michael-and-Oksana0]

Hi Sarah,

I disagree. Our Air experience around the world to date has been great up until now. not always 100% but hey we are reasonable people who have overlooked minor issues in the past as we know it is not realistic for the host to fix in the time we are there.  all good.

But it is the Hosts, and unfortunately it does tarnish everyone, when they are prepared to lie about a guest. I am not a host so have no vested intereset  in that side of the coin.   

As you say, Air BnB customer service is also at fault for ot taking action (in line with policies and terms of service). 

I am 100% certain that if I lied about Air BnB they would not be happy and would take action.  why? to protect their (lets face it getting shabbier by the moment) reputation.  But they are not prepared to do the same courtesy for their paying customers.

My only hope is that every customer has this experience and votes with their feet by leaving Air BnB. Surely somone out there can do a better job of this than they are prepared to. 

No other business I know of would condone poeple lying about anything.

As you can see I am totally disappointed by this non response. 

[Sarah977]

@Michael-and-Oksana0  I'm not sure what you disagree with that I said. I'm glad your Airbnb experiences have been great up to now- most guests are lovely people and most hosts try to provide decent accommodation and treat their guests well.

But thinking that guests also don't lie in their reviews is incorrect. You wouldn't think they do because you are decent people who wouldn't do something like that yourselves. These forums are full of posts by hosts who have years of 5* reviews and happy guests and have had their ratings tanked by 1 disgruntled guest who wrote a vindictive, lying review because they were called out by the host for sneaking in extra people, asked to pay for damage they caused, etc. And Airbnb refuses to remove the lying review, even though it is at odds with all the host's other rave reviews because nothing in it violates their review policies. Apparently lying doesn't contravene review policy.

You should keep at Airbnb to remove the review, and if they refuse to, you can write a response to that review which makes it clear that the host was not truthful. If you have a history of good reviews, other hosts will see through the bad review and it won't prevent you from having future bookings accepted. But I know it's infuriating to be lied about.

[Michael-and-Oksana0]

Hi Sarah,

Sorry, i disagreerd with "the blame for unhappy users who can't get a legimate complaint dealt with responsibly rests solely with their inconsistent and poor customer service which doesn't look at individual cases in any sort of depth." some balme has to lay with the poeple who lie in the first place. In my case the host. I think you misundertood as I didnt say that guests dont lie. I am sure some do. I dont lie in my reviews but I can only speak for myself.

But I doon't have any interaction with other guests and to my knowledge they cannot leave a lying review of me in breach of the Terms of Service. So that is a non issue, for me.

Keep at Air BnB you say?

I wish I could. I responded to their email 'closing the case' saying this outcome was unacceptable t ome. they have not replied and I don't expect that they will. they have tied a bow around it and moved on. Shameful.

I can no longer reply to the review as I did not want to initially, confident I could get Air to see reason and take some action. they didnt. now I don't have the option to post a reply.

But as I explained to both case managers, even if I did what is the point of responding, it just looks like a he said she said situation. no one will care and likely any future Hosts I may try to book with will take this lie of a review into consideration. that is criminal in my mind. 

Their response to that, we suggest you post a reply. . . broken record on a loop...

[Sarah977]

@Michael-and-Oksana0  Well of course it's unacceptable for anyone to post damaging lies. And I can even understand that if a host or guest is new to the platform, that Airbnb would have no way of knowing if a review was true or not. And when you have millions of users worldwide, there are always going to be nasty people in the mix who have no compunction about lying.

But when a guest or host has a history of good reviews, and contacts them about a situation like this, where it's easy to see that the review is an outlier, their robotic responses are appalling.

As a booking platform, connecting hosts and guests, Airbnb is fine. It's when there are contentious issues that you see their true colors. It wasn't always like this, but the bigger the company gets, the more revenue it generates, the more arrogant they have become. They don't seem to care if they piss off a few hundred hosts and guests and they leave the platform- I guess they figure there's more where we came from, all eager to sign up with them.

It's one thing to have the customer service front line deal with issues like payment problems, tech issues, explaining policy and protocol. But when there are serious disputes, they should be being handled by mature, experienced people with mediation training, not some 20 year old at a call center in the Phillipines getting paid slave wages.

 And the other infuriating thing is that their responses are totally inconsistent. Had you contacted them originally 3 minutes earlier, or 3 minutes later, you could have gotten a different CS rep who was helpful, really worked to investigate, and ruled in your favor. It seems to be the luck of the draw, which is insane.

[Nina75]

You have 10 great reviews and 1 bad one. Move on with your life.

[Joy367]

Airbnb does nothing to help, period!! I have stopped using this service because of the terrible customer service not to mention many of the listing are listed else where for less money.

[Dave-and-Deb0]

Actually, it is really easy to contact Airbnb.  Have you looked at the Contact Airbnb Help Guide in my signature below @Tammy37?

[Alex492]

No, it's not easy to contact AirBnB at all. Three options are given. The first is to contact the 'AirBnB Community Experts'. But that's not a way of contacting AirBnB at all -- as the instructions state, these 'experts' are not employees of AirBnB, so they can't legally speak for AirBnB concerning the issues I want to contact AirBnB about. The second means of contacting AirBnB is to use Twitter. But I don't have a Twitter account and don't think I should be expected to sign up for a Twitter account simply to contact representatives of an entirely different company. The third option is to call AirBnB. But AirBnB expliclty discourages this ("these phone numbers... are meant for URGENT MATTERS so it is best to use the above two methods first"), and in any case this is not an "easy" way of contacting AirBnB since it requires waiting on hold for extend periods. If it were easy to contact AirBnB there would be no need for an extensive list of instructions for contacting AirBnB, and those instructions would not be full of complaints from numerous disaffected customers about how difficult it is to contact AirBnB (see link below).

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Help/Contact-Airbnb-A-Community-Help-Guide-UPDATED/m-p/413245

[Clare0]

@Alex492  What you have posted is correct except for one detail.  The Community of Experts (which you initially get for help through 

www.airbnb.com/help/contact_us ) have the means of connecting you directly to an Airbnb agent if they are not able to solve the issue.  The Community of Experts also have additional assistance / resources  from Airbnb so it is not like asking for assistance from hosts here in this community forum.  

Clare

[Alex492]

Thanks for the clarification, but that doesn't point to an inaccuracy in what I said. The 'Community Experts' are not employees of AirBnB, as explicitly stated at the link I provided. So they cannot legally speak for AirBnB. So contacting them is simply not a "way of contacting AirBnB", let alone an *easy* way of contacting AirBnB. I, along with many other frustrated customers on this forum, simply want an easy way of contacting AirBnB directly, without mediation by people who are not legal representatives of AirBnB. It was stated above by 'Dave & Deb' that "it is really easy to contact Airbnb". This is simply false, as attested by the numerous complaints on this forum, and the existence of sites with titles like 'Airbnb Hell'.

[Lylia1]

Airbnb has always been helpful and fair. Strange and sometimes unfair situations arise for both travellers and hosts. Think of the many millions of members seeking contact for questions that are easily answered by actually reading the answers online. Overwhelming! Every reservation, whether as a host or traveller offers contact options online and response always comes within 24 hours or less. Anything that is an immediate emergency there are contact phone numbers with long hold times but very effective when contact has been made. They will immediately find alternative accommodations when needed and deal with the offending host or traveller. After four years of being both an Airbnb traveller and Airbnb host I have nothing but praise for the company.

[Brandon240]

They did NOT help me rebook when my host cancelled day of arrival during the busiest time of year (between Christmas and over New Years) and now refuse to pay the difference for the cheapest option I found and booked myself! They have been awful to us!

[Johann59]

I have notices that the host confirms allowing pets on their filter/site. However when one request a booking to confirm whether pet friendly they suddenly do not allow pets.