Guest asking for refund 12 hours before check-in.

[Bk9]

Hello,

I am new to hosting and found myself in an unfortunate situation that I would love experienced host's advice on. 

A guest booked our place for 6 nights, two months in advance. We have a strict cancellation policy. 

12 hours before check-in, we received a message from the guest saying there was an unexpected death in the family and they won't be able to make it. She asked for a refund for the trip. 

While I am saddened by her situation and would like to refund her as a human, we also rely on the income from our AirBnB. Giving a full discount financially makes it very difficult for us. I suggested that she cancels the booking immediately so that we can open our calendar and that we'd refund her for all the days we're able to rebook. We're in NYC so last minute bookings are usually possible. I also suggested she reach out to CS, incase they can provide a better solution. 

A few hours later, we heard from AirBnB customer service and this is the part we got pretty upset. The CS person wrote us a message where he went into the details of the death in the guest's family, which I won't include here, and asked if we'd offer a refund as an act of good will. I didn't appreciate being put in a position where CS is providing details we never asked to know, which made a decision that was already difficult a lot worse. Again, if we were able to just offer the full refund we would but financially it is not possible for us. 

I wrote back to CS and explained we'd be happy to offer a partial refund if we're able to rebook the place, but we need the guest to cancel in order to do that.

We haven't heard back from CS in over a day, now the guest's trip already looks like its in progress and I am not sure what we should do next. 

The situation of the guest is horrible and I feel for them but I also don't think the financial responsibility and burden should be put completely on the host...

Would really appreciate any thoughts or suggestions.

Thank you

[Gillian166]

oh this is such a terrible position to be in @Bk9  I've done some refunds for last-minute covid, but financially i've only been "risking" <$200. (although last xmas a guy booked to 2 weeks qt over xmas and asked to cancel halfway thru as the govt released him early and i lost 5 days of high season. yes, I gave him the refund)

This is where you have to put your "kindness matters" and "value myself" hats on at the same time, and it's a very difficult situation to realise that whilst you want to be a kind and generous human to another going through something difficult, you have a business to consider.

It really isn't your fault that this happened and you don't have to issue a refund.
Your initial offer to refund if you get the days re-booked was very fair. The guests should have reacted quickly and taken that offer, but instead they are holding out for a full refund. Not cool. 
I would NOT have suggested they ring CS, who have now bungled this up for the guest.

[Bk9]

Thank you for your reply @Gillian166, really appreciate it! The financial implication of refunding for us is unfortunately over 1k so I couldn't go with my gut reaction of "i need to refund immediately". 

It was my rookie mistake to suggesting they call CS, I assumed they'd possibly have another solution/insurance but seems like that is usually not the case. Lesson learned. 

Again, thank you for taking the time to reply! 

[Clara116]

@Bk9 sorry you are having to deal with this. Yes its awful for everyone. The guest is responsible to cancel the trip - if they don't either online or by contacting CS that is not on you. You did the right thing by saying and responding as you did. Stand strong and tell CS you have made your decision and you need no details - if the guest didn't give them to you - its actually a violation for CS to pass on private info as they seem to have done in this instance. Not cool in my opinion. 

Do not communicate any further with the guest - as they should have cancelled - if they were waiting for you to do it - that's not correct and you'd be penalized and fined also. 

Death never is easy and we are never prepared for it - but I've read that some guests mothers have died 6 times in the past year. So just ignore any one pushing you - if they had cancelled and you rebooked you said you'd give a refund. If that hasn't happened let AirCover or Airbnb take care of it. You should not be taking the complete burden on this one

peace, Clara

[Bob297]

@Bk9 

You gave the right answer. They should use their travel insurance for a death in the family. You are not an insurance company.

[Anonymous]

@Bk9  We all know what it's like to be grieving the loss of a loved one. It can be an emotionally complicated experience, and all kinds of feelings come up. But you know, one thing that never occurred to me in that situation is to think "how can I milk this grief for a refund?"

Maybe the guest is being totally honest, maybe they're not. But it's a matter they should take up with their travel insurance, which is not you. It's Airbnb's standard practice to pressure hosts to refund guests out of pocket when guests ask them to, and I'm really disgusted by that. They're a multibillion dollar company; if they want to do a "good will gesture" for a guest there's no limit to the credits they can offer from their own coffers for it. But no, they ask hosts to sacrifice their income instead. Don't let these sleazeballs get to you.

Just give your warm condolences to the guests for their loss, advise them to cancel and make a claim on their insurance, and move on. 

[Dora486]

@Anonymous  great response.  Business is business, unfair of Airbnb to try to guilt hosts into refunds.