> culminating in a stay where the residence was completely unsuitable for habitation (extremely cold & heating was broken, no linens/towels, mold & damp issues) and airbnb caught us in some sort of bizarro catch-22.
This isn't normal? Unfortunately I've used Airbnb twice and this was my experience both times. Put it down partially to someone else booking it and probably being a bit cheap but yeah I'm just gonna use hotels haha. At least you can point issues out to them in person.
For me Airbnb has a reputation of being the place landlords list the shitholes they can't rent to people normally
Re:The $10m OMG Fund
by radu_floricica on Wednesday June 22, 2022 @08:11AM
(#31834990)
I had one bad host experience, with a listing that as far as I can tell just didn't exist. Sent info to airbnb, including screenshots of trying to call the host. Got reimbursed in full in a few weeks. Pretty much what I expected them to do.
Since airbnb is a marketplace, it pays to look at host ratings and reviews, or just filter by superhost. If you pick somebody with 2 reviews that just opened, you have to be aware it's a gamble. It's not necessarily a mistake, depending on context, but a gamble.
Had this scenario in SF and lost out on $4k. Support just closed each chat to stop responses. The transcript of the phone calls they provided was inaccurate and they refused to provide the original audio.
Basically they said: "we can't refund you until you give the host a fair opportunity to address the issues, so get back to us in 24 hours if the host hasn't done anything". When the host failed to do anything and we re-contacted airbnb, they said that the period of validity for us to file a complaint and get a refund had expired, and they would not do anything to help us.
My wife and I fought this, HARD. One of the few times I've basically seen red while trying to sort out a simple issue like this. The host was contacted by airbnb and was livid, and became extremely hostile and unfriendly to us in communications. We ended up getting a hotel nearby and working out the whole thing through travel insurance. Honestly, fuck airbnb.