For anybody who has yet to see this, especially if you haven’t logged into your Airbnb for a while due to COVID-19, Airbnb is showing its leadership and commitment to hosts. 
Apparently we’ve also landed a man on the moon, and JFK is dead.
Old news.
JF
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LOL I did a search and didn’t find it anywhere on the forum. Plenty of low-tech people like me out there…
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Thank you for sharing. I think there was an email but I haven’t checked it out, and this reminds me that I should. I appreciate it, thx!
PS - I can’t stand looking at him though. And evidently not listening either … Maybe I’ll just go for a close captioned version, read in a computer voice, with my eyes closed. Hahah
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This is the main thread discussing it though I think there are several others.
you’ll see that not everyone is swooning at his commitment to hosts
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-Hosts will now receive 25% of cancelled bookings due to COVID-19 from Airbnb
-Hosts and Experience Hosts most affected by COVID-19 may apply for $5k Airbnb grants
-Hosts may offer whole listings to medical and first responder personnel, Airbnb takes no %
This is really great news IMO and shows commitment to hosts from the CEOs of Airbnb. Doing the right thing takes courage and shows true leadership in a time of crisis.
Apologies for any reposts because I am still not finding this anywhere on the forum through a subject search. There may be many hosts like me who are unaware of this news, even if it is old to others, as we have blocked off calendars and have no bookings for several months.
Many hosts also don’t know how to file for the PPP on the SBA website and Airbnb has added that information on the page as well. I have spoken to several people who still haven’t filed for PPP and didn’t know it was a finite amount of money that end in June. This forum is a place for hosts to support each other so let’s get this information out there as much as possible. Thank you
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No, hosts don’t receive 25% of their cancelled bookings. They are supposedly going to receive 25% of the amount they would have received if their cancellation policy had been upheld. 25% of that is 12.5% of the total reservation amount.
And no, you can’t apply for the $5000 grant. Airbnb will decide, in their great wisdom, who is worthy of receiving a grant and will “invite” those hosts deemed worthy to apply.
I wouldn’t get too gushy and appreciative of any of this PR until you actually see some money. Read the fine print.
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I’m not getting anything since all my cancellations already happened and they were all given 100% refunds.
You still don’t understand. These proposed payouts are for reservations which were cancelled and received 100% refunds.
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OH! You’re right, I didn’t understand. lol I’ll take whatever they’re offering. March is what put us into a hole and I have already been turned down by two banks for the Payroll Protection Program loans because I didn’t have a business account.
Airbnb is a young company, with young CEO’s with young ideals and boldness. I’m not gushing, just pleased that they’re aware of the issues facing hosts and trying to do something. Chesky clearly admits that he harmed hosts by giving full refunds, and even though this is coming after the majority of cancellations happened, I am confident that they are at least trying to do the right thing, and that takes courage and a sense of integrity. I for one, am grateful because I have nothing coming in, from anywhere, and am trying not to lose everything. Something is better than nothing, and doing the right thing isn’t always easy and mistakes will be made and the process is malleable and could change again several times before this is all over.
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Well, you’re a lot less cynical than most of us. I haven’t seen any evidence of trying to do the right thing or having anything even close to integrity. It’s all about PR spin, and countering bad press, nothing to do with caring about hosts.
Chesky isn’t some idealistic young buck- he’s a clever manipulator with a net worth of $4.5 billion.
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Huh. I guess you’ve put me on ignore.
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? No way that would ever happen, Dusty. I have input the info several times, and people like me will just put COVID in the subject search and none of those threads pop up. I posted this bc I just saw it a few minutes ago on my Airbnb because i was responding to a guest with a booking in June.
Fair enough. It’s funny because most people would describe me as supremely cynical, and I’m the one who balked at the refunds and was filleted to a crisp on this forum for doing so.
But maybe I have been out of touch with airbnb since it’s dead in the water atm, and compared to watching our government lie and cheat and straight-up murder people in the United States, this message seems almost heroic.
There are a lot of things to like about Airbnb. For me, I appreciate the non-discrimination policy, the fair wage pledge, the 3% commission, (which I think is fair), and the housing of humans in crisis, like when there were the fires on the west coast of the US. These things inspire me.
That said, I am not without my complaints, but I also don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, especially when nobody else is helping me with squat. I have literally lost 100% of my income overnight and am just trying to ride this out, while also doing the right thing and staying safe. I have no idea wth I’m doing right now. I wish I could just stay in my house like so many others and “be bored” but am stressed out, so forgive me for sharing information with other hosts who may be just like me and have no idea that this message was posted. Please. They may have also better reading comprehension skills than I and will suss out all the info better. lol Thank you
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Ah, I see. Well it was the main topic 7-8 days ago and I think we deleted some duplicates. But it also went off the rails somewhat so you might not want to drag through it all.
LOL thanks for the warning. things can get a bit gnarly on this forum. I did check beforehand because I know the forum doesn’t like duplicates, but when I entered COVID in the subject search box, nothing came up with the video. Thanks for leaving this up so as many people can get the information as possible! Like I said, I hadn’t even looked at my own airbnb listings for ages until getting a guest message–and will millions of hosts, for sure there will be others just like me.
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So nobody got anything and this was just a publicity stunt. Out of thousands of dollars in lost bookings, I received less than $200usd. What a freaking JOKE. Not sure if I’ll ever come back to Airbnb after this is all over.
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Not correct. While it is all anecdotal, there are several hosts reporting that they’ve received non repayable grants from Airbnb and other hosts appear to have received the 25% of bookings cancelled that had Strict Cancellation policies.
We have a Moderate Cancellation policy (our market isn’t suitable for strict) and we received nada from all the cancelled bookings; not just Airbnb but BDC and HA also. I also doubt we will receive anything from the SH fund, unless of course an invite drop into the inbox shortly.
Yep, you got that right over a month ago, in relation to this topic.
Courage and integrity are not terms I’d expect to see describing Airbnb.
You won’t be missed. Hosts are an expendable resource to Airbnb, easily illustrated by the differing ways BDC & VRBO/HA dealt with this issue, where they were host centric, as opposed to Airbnb’s guest centric approach. But then again, Airbnb has been heading in that direction for some time, so no change there really.
JF
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Who said no-one got anything I have received six pay outs.
However I wasn’t actually expecting any money to be returned to me under the 25% superhost strict policy payout so anything was a bonus
For me Airbnb is still the best marketing channel so at the moment have no reason not to come back and use them @LetsShareThoughts
As previously discussed, hosts with entire homes have lots of options. Those of us doing what I do are stuck with Airbnb. Maybe Airbnb won’t make it through this after it’s all over.