Guest checked in another hotel

ps: haha hol inn is 2 mins from us. Not very good as well! lol.
Im so shocked they done this.

I am still not clear. The earlier message says the guest claimed to not be aware that you had lost your phone because the messages did not come through before her phone died.

So when did they agree to use email and refuse the other phone number? Was this before or after they checked into the Holiday Inn?

Hi @sunshine1

I am sorry this happened to you. However if I lost my phone at the weekend and was expecting guests on Monday, I would have got a cheap mobile (here you can get one for 15-20 pounds) so you had a quick way of contacting each other or at least borrowed your partnerā€™s and given those details to your guest.

The superhost number is the same as the general number, they just prioritise your call.

If you have your full address and check in procedure, on the booking confirmation you donā€™t need to worry, they could have brought it with them even if you didnā€™t message them.

As well as talking to Airbnb, make sure you clearly message your guest confirming that you were there at the agreed check in time of XXX and waiting until 7 p.m ie for four hours and during that period that no-one. buzzed your apartment. That they are welcome to cancel their booking but it is now too late to find a replacement booking, so the cancellation policy will be as outlined on your listing.

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I messaged at 13.03pm to say about no phone but giving apt number again etc,
She messaged at 16.26pm to say they were on their way to my place (Obviously had wifi then- would of saw address) ( from where they were coming it would be 1-2 hrs depending on route you take).
At 19.36pm i sent a message to ask how they were getting on as no sign.
At 19.45pm she replied saying she hadnt received any flat number etc

ps: at this stage in message they also said theyd checked into hol Inn.

Okā€¦so now that they are aware you donā€™t have a phone, then still refused to take your partnerā€™s phone number down and perfer to use email?

Anyway, I have no idea if the messaging system can have a lag with only incoming messages and not with outgoing messages. So even if Airā€™s system wasnā€™t working, then she should be asking Air for her first nightā€™s refund, and not be asking you for it.

Regardless, it seems a bit silly that she somehow had your phone number written on a piece of paper, yet she never bothered to write the address down. Are they coming for the remainder of their reservation?

Yes i know were you are coming from. However, there has been 2 out of 300plus guests who have tried to text / ring me-
Usually people are savy enough to use the airbnb message system. They have all the full / complete address when booking, no excuse not to write it down.
I would never not think of writing an address down i was staying in. whether hotel/ or airbnb.

There is somthing fishy about this guest i cant put my finger on. maybe she changed her mind and is trying to hold against me , me losing my phone.

A one night, luckily- or not so lucky.
Kind of people who expect a hotel reception ie doors open all the time.
I havent heard from air yet so havent a clue whether she or they have contacted each other.
To be honest i find it a bit funny she is using my 'lost phone; as an excuse. I probably just give her one. as never before as it happened.

@sunshine1 Iā€™m sorry but I canā€™t help but feel that some of this mess is your creation.

Why are you contacting guests on the day of arrival with an address and asking for an arrival time? Why arenā€™t you sending/asking for this information days before? To be honest it shouldnā€™t have mattered too much that you had lost you phone, but by adding it into the mix it gave your guests the impression everything was disorganised and they decided to go elsewhere.

I totally think they should have to meet the cost of the whole booking but I also think you need to sharpen up your welcome procedures.

Iā€™ve never sent my guests the address via the messaging system; even when they ask for it I tell them to go find it (and the directions) on their booking confirmation because I want them to learn where to find everything. My advice; stop spoon feeding your guests and start beginning the check in process days before not hours before arrival.

Well since it was only a one night booking then I agree that the guests decided at that last minute they prefer to stay at the Holiday Inn.

As soon as you can use your partnerā€™s phone I would try to call Air and speak with them. This issue has nothing to do with your phone going missing. You were following the Airbnb rules of messaging them through the Airbnb app. And thatā€™s how Air wants you to communicate. So if Airā€™s messaging system had a lag of sending your messages, that is on Air.

Regardless the guests could have easily dialed the Air phone number from the friendā€™s phone and asked for the address or logged in from that phone.

Please keep us posted.

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Zandra, the address was giving when guests booked and 2 times after.

Thank you Cabinhost- your advice is always clear!. I will be sure to keep you updated.

I send a guest PDF and the directions ar listed online as well, or should be. Thereā€™s no excuse for the guest not being ready for their checkin.

It seems like a misunderstanding but I think the guests are always ready to take full advantage of their own disorganization and call it yours. Stand your ground. If you sent them arrival instructions and they decided to turn up hours later I d Not think you should be held responsible because you didnā€™t have a phone in the interim.

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K I think they just changed mind at last minute. maybe they arent even in the Hol Inn!

If airbnb do favour these guests i will seriously consider looking at other options

Iā€™m the same. My other half and I each have two phones. We each have one thatā€™s used for business and one thatā€™s used for personal calls. So if one of our phones was lost and that was the number showing on Airbnb, Iā€™d get on the laptop and give the incoming guests a different number. Our ā€˜personalā€™ phones are older ones but still work fine.

So with the laptops, iPad, various phones etc. I donā€™t see why the OPā€™s phone being lost was an issue. Correct me if Iā€™m wrong :slight_smile:

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And if you were driving in your car you are not expected to answer texts and phone calls. That is dangerous anyway! Or what if you were on an important phone call and could not answer them immediately?

Airbnb cannot say that hosts have to be available to answer their phones 24 hours a day. This would mean that any guest can claim a host didnā€™t answer them and now they deserve to get a full refund.

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Also, on iCloud, thereā€™s a free Find-My-Phone service which we (or rather, he) uses a lot. :slight_smile:

I also have written in my notes profile that we understand some guest do not have access to phones., so to make sure they take down address / directions. As ive said before ive never had it happen before. guests rarely have contacted me by phone (Other than some pernickety mature Usa guy yrs ago).
Its very bizarre she mentions in her claim that shes foreign and doesnt have a phone working all the time, but that was the (allegedly) contact she decided to use.
In her claim she also states that she was outside the address for 30mins, so obviously she took note of some directions but not the actual apt number! She also stated she tried to call from her friends phone and a taxi drivers phone. In this case, the driver would have had internet access or could of directed her to an internet cafe or a mountain of bars/ restauants in the area for internet access. My partner also arrived back from work at 7.20pm and saw noone outside the apt.
Anway i have declined her request. But i wont hold my breath for air to side with the guest.

I do think this is a plausible (but of course irritating for the host) reason for not being able to check in. Assuming the guests battery has gone, and they didnā€™t write down the new phone number.

I had a guest who was severely delayed (turned up 24 hours after their expected check in) who didnā€™t keep me updated on their arrival and didnā€™t even write down the directions to my flat. Instead they went to central London and showed my address which they had written down to strangers; someone was eventually able to direct them. It was pure luck I was able to check them in; I had decided to take a nap and didnā€™t hear the call from my building management. My guests did pound the door down though. But had they not been able to get into the building ā€¦ it would have been a different story.

That said your guest wasnā€™t delayed and therefore shouldnā€™t have unexpectedly lost power in their device. I would definitely say your guests were pulling a fast one, I just donā€™t get whyā€¦

The guests might also have been arriving after a long, draining flight?

From start to finish, I have a 28 hour flight to get from India to Stateside. If I couldnā€™t check into my AirBnB I would probably be like these guests and say, ā€œforget it, Iā€™m exhausted, and thereā€™s a hotel right down the road. Letā€™s just go there.ā€ I wouldnā€™t wait in a cafe and use the WiFi to send a message and wait who knows how long for a response from a host who might be asleep or busy doing other things.

Not saying itā€™s the case here but I too completely understand how some guests might call it quits before check-in.

I donā€™t agree @PHX

The only way they could have got to right outside the apartments is if they had the actual address. Why would they taken down the whole address bar, the actual apartment number.

Thatā€™s the part in their story that doesnā€™t make sense.

Nor does them having their co-travellers phone and not bothering to log into their account to check the address on their booking confirmation.

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