I rent two separate Queen rooms, each with private ensuite bath. This is my third season. I’ve had to call Air CS several times over the years and always, the experience has been positive and I’ve had my issue resolved. Given the numerous reports of terrible CS I’ve read about on the forum, I attributed my relative success to the fact I’m a Superhost and pretty much always have been.
That all changed today. I have a guest scheduled to check in tomorrow. Guest wrote me, on Air message system telling me they wouldn’t be able to come tomorrow, but no worries, they were sending some friends in their place. I tend to evaluate situations as they arise, and I’ve hosted 3rd party bookings in the past when I knew about them well in advance, but this one just had my Spidy senses tingling and was making me uncomfortable.
I called CS and explained the situation clearly. The rep wasn’t listening and first threatened to kick me off the platform for arranging a booking outside of Airbnb. I explained the situation again, and asked him to please review the messages between the guest and me. He did, and basically asked me what my problem was. I explained the guest was outside of Airbnb policy, and that I wanted him to “reach out” to the guest and explain to them that they would need to cancel their reservation. His reply was, “So, you want to cancel the reservation?”
Long story short, he argued with me about what the policy was, told me I could cancel he reservation if I wanted to but I would be penalized, and on and on. I ended up hanging up on him and am currently awaiting a call back from, hopefully, a rep with more of a clue.
This was an instant book reservation, so if push comes to shove I will cancel it myself, but I’d rather Air do it, because for some bizarre reason I don’t totally trust that I won’t be penalized if I cancel it myself.