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my 2nd bad experience:- (its getting really frustrating now)
We just started airbnb this year and had 5 stars from each of our 14 guests we had so far, we loved the experience. Until this lady books in
Our guest, ‘Z’, checked-in to our house at 7pm booked for 5 days. We have a huge 4 bedroom shared house wherein 1 airbnb was for rental and which is very much away from other bedrooms. (airbnb bedroom on 1st floor of the house and other bedrooms are on 2nd floor).
The moment ‘Z’ checked-in she was complaining about how far this place is from BART transport since she doesnt have car. She should have checked that before. I ignored and suggested 5$ uber rides.
After I stepped out of the house for few minutes at 8pm, she sends messages that someone opened her bedroom door. I came back home immediately, within minutes of her text. I thought someone broke into house. I checked my motion security cameras that we have in house front door,garage and in backyard, and there wasnt anybody there. We have top notch security system in the house, so i checked for everything. No broken windows, no windows opened during that time frame. We live in a windy area (wind farms nearby), so I believe that wind pressure when the main door was opened, must have caused her bedroom door to move, making her think that someone is there trying to open the door, though she mentioned she didnt see anyone’s face. There was also a possibility that our dog sometimes rolls on the loft that is above this bedroom causing rolling noise. I tried explaining to her but she didnt want to talk, she didnt come out of her bedroom to explain. After a while I noticed that she left with her bags.
After all this I believe she is making up stuff since she realized this is far from BART transport.
I called airbnb, and rep told me that her profile pic is not real too. I assumed it was empty pic, like facebook, so it was supposed to be like that but rep told me that empty pic looks very different in airbnb, in fact this guest had uploaded a pic that looks like a empty pic. I was told rep would call me back after talking to the manager handling the case. Didn’t hear back. Day later I am being told that the case is against me with trust and safety team. I am not being paid for those days and still my days remains blocked until case manager calls me back, which can take forever.
There was no breakin and I am a gay guy hosting this lady, so obviously there was no intention of anyone trying to open the door and entry point cameras proved that.
I think she is trying to fake things to dupe airbnb and me to get free stuff.
Just worried and sad with the latest 2 bad experiences.
-Suhas
Oh, Suhas, I am SO SORRY. My advice to you would be to stay calm when dealing with T&S and state your case as firmly as possible. Since you weren’t home AND you have security cameras it seems like a very straightforward matter, but my experience has been that Air usually sides with the guests. But they may pay you for the day anyway. Or let you keep the cleaning, or something. We feel for ya, I can tell you that. Keep us up on any news, eh?
@smilesuhas - she sounds dreadful. But my advice, for what it’s worth, is to just not worry about it. Read the posts here in this forum - we’ve all had our crazies or guests with ridiculous expectations and they are not worth worrying about. Move on to your next guests.
If you’re hosting for fun (rather than the money) then she’s not worth the mental aggravation. If you’re hosting for the money, then consider how many hours you’ll be spending a) worrying about the situation and b) going back and forth with Airbnb. Let’s say that your time is worth $50 per hour and you spend 5 hours dealing with Airbnb. That woman will have ‘cost’ you $250 and she certainly wasn’t worth it.
Because it’s a room in your house, I imagine that you didn’t make much money from this guest so don’t give her the satisfaction of using up your valuable time in addition.
Concentrate on your future guests, forget her and you’ll soon get more great reviews
I have my eye on a castle in ireland, 900 euros for one night. Am going to book it, stay the night and say a door opened by itself or a local ghost did it and say i felt unsafe and claim my money book.
Nothing was missing. Either she wanted free credits from Air or she was just weird. One of her 24 previous reviews did mention that there was something weird about her. Initially i ignored that 1 review since other 23 reviews seemed ok. Next time onwards I’ll make sure I read each and every review even if they are a lot.
This is craziness! So now guests can just cry “someone opened my door when I was alone in the house” and now they get a refund?
Please keep us posted on the outcome, and sorry you had this experience. If Air does end up siding with this guest…will you share their reasoning if she admitted to being in the house alone?
Will keep you posted.
*She wasnt alone and my husband was in our master bedroom taking shower (on 2nd floor). The staircase between 2nd floor and 1st floor is camera monitored and there was nothing there during the 10 minutes that I was out for. And according to her message that she wrote to me “It wasnt you guys, but there was a man…” . When I came back home she talked only through the door and mentioned she didnt see the person and that she doesnt want to talk to us anymore. If she did not see the person, how can she tell that it was a ‘man’ and how can she tell that it wasnt us.
I explained all this to Air along with the fact about her misleading profile pic. Still waiting but one of the reps told me that this summer there has been a big surge in reported cases.
I would suggest you all to do more profile scrutiny during summers.
