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To prevent he said she said issues like this, I video tape with a time stamp everything in my suite prior to check in.
I show the clean toilets, showers, fridge, etc,
I show toilets flush, tv turns on and streaming devices work as promised.
I pick up the bed sheets to show there is no bed bugs.
I show AC works, fans, etc.
Yes, it’s a pain to have to do this but this way, no one can claim they didn’t do it.
I started doing this becasue of a situation like yours where you can’t quite prove the damage. Without the time stamp video proof it’s hard to file a claim.
It won’t hurt to try to go through AirCover. Put in a claim and wait to see what happens before you buy the dent repair kit. I wonder if you can make a claim with your homeowner’s depending on what’s your deductible.
I’ve been covered by AirCover for damage the guest denied doing (their teenaged daughter hit the TV and cracked the screen and, unsurprisingly, didn’t tell uptight daddy). But they gave me depreciated value for it and it took numerous emails to AirBnB and a loooooong time (months).
I’m not sure AirBnB would cover a dent in a refrigerator but go ahead and try if you have the time and patience. I suspect at best, you’d get back the repair kit price.
I would only go after deliberate damage and extensive preventable pet damage. I consider accidents and kid damage to be normal wear and tear. I try to furnish my place in a way that is resilient, repairable, or easily replaced. I’m also paying for repairs with before-tax dollars.
We recently had some pretty terrible guests (and yes I left an honest review to warn future hosts). My husband and I watched in complete disbelief as one the young adult males urinated in broad daylight in our neighbors yard. We were super nervous as to how we would find the apartment upon checkout. One of the guests had wet the bed, and we found deep gouges on the top of our hardwood coffee table.
The guest left us a review as soon as they got the “leave a review message”, so we decided to reach out and ask them about the damage. They agreed to pay for the professional cleaning of the mattress, but claimed the coffee table was damaged upon arrival.
Luckily I know a professional wood restorer and he wrote me an estimate and also stated that the damage was clearly new. I submitted it to Airbnb and they very quickly covered the cost of the repairs. I do feel that the official estimate from a legit business helped to resolve the issue quickly.
I’m glad that this got sorted out as best as could be expected.
The problem here is that it’s not easy to find an available professional, and when a professional does come they often want charge A LOT. So I often do repairs DIY with me doing the research and our gardener/sometime cleaner doing the actual work. The bill won’t look as professional but the amount will be FAR LESS then what most professionals here want to charge because they make so much more money on renovations or big projects than on repair work.
In case you can’t fix it, depending on how big the dent is, and where it is located, you could try something I did in a similar situation with a stainless steel fridge. I bought a stainless steel refrigerator magnet with some useful information on it and put that over the dent.
Of course, if you don’t care about the magnet being stainless steel, there are plenty of options for fridge magnets to cover the dent.
I don’t like fridge magnets, so I wanted something that would be more inconspicuous. They have some magnets out there that have useful information and are made of stainless so they don’t stick out like a sore thumb.
The other reason I wanted stainless is that the magnets are rigid. Some magnets are flexible, and would just emphasize the dent because they would follow the contour of the dent.
One of the thing that Breezeway recommends, and also our Worcester community emergency response team, is to have a one page sheet on the refrigerator with information that a guest needs to know, like the emergency number (911), Poison Control. See attached. I emailed this document to VistaPrint, and – for no cost – their design team made a nice design with the colors we wanted. We bought that information sheet in a magnetized form and put it on our refrigerator.
For us, this information sheet does not hide our dent as it is pretty low on the refrigerator – but it’s a good idea.
It’s a good question. For me, it’s a combination of the value & age of the item, my sense of how/why the item the damaged (party/clear negligence vs every day use vs accident that could have happened to anyone), and the ability to pinpoint the cost of replacement/repair.
I will also say, I made a decision early on to not DIY Airbnb repairs. If something isn’t working I call in a professional (plumber, electrician, painter, etc) or I replace it (linens, furniture, items).
In your specific situation, I personally wouldn’t be spending my time tracking down repair kits and trying to make something work. I respect that you’re doing it that way but I’ve just created a boundary for myself. My Airbnb is a business. I keep all my money for the Airbnb in its own account. If I draw a profit distribution from it, I write myself a check. I do not co-mingle my personal finances. Therefore, if something needs repair, I draw from that account. Each month I set aside 10% of my gross sales for maintenance. So, if my fridge was dented I would do 1 of 2 things. Either I would chalk it up to life and take an updated picture for my listing OR I would call an appliance repair shop with my model number, explain the part that needed replacement and ask them to email me an estimate. Then I would submit the estimate in an Aircover claim. If approved, I would move forward with the repair. If not, I would decide if I wanted to spend the money out of pocket. The time spent doing either of those things I would consider within the normal course of business. While passive income is nice, running an Airbnb does require some hands on time and I consider things like this to be part of that.
Now add contacting the guest, contacting Airbnb, contacting them again, arguing with them about it, getting another estimate, etc. Depending on the specifics of each case, many people decide to cut their losses and move on without adding the Airbnb part to their pain. For example:
If Piton could have just gone to Best Buy and grabbed a replacement TV for $300, she probably would have done that when all factors were weighed. But on the island that’s not an option. And sometimes there is a denial of the claim by Airbnb. I’m happy to see multiple people say they have been paid for claims though.
I used to be in your mindset with this but after multiple posts on the topic over the years here, I’ve resigned myself to the apparent reality that this is considered acceptable to various degrees by many, if not most, people. Maybe most here would be dismayed by your experience only because it was in the neighbors yard, not yours.
I watched in disbelief this past week as a man standing outside an expensive sports car double parked in the street stood, facing inward toward the car spent quite a bit of time manipulating/adjusting/doing something in the front of his pants for several long seconds. He could have been peeing in the street, tucking in his shirt or airing out the contents of his steamer trunks for all I know. Outdoor diners sitting adjacent and all of us passing on the sidewalk were probably gawking. In my case it wasn’t so much the all too typical male behavior, attention was called to him because of the car. This is not a city where one sees Italian sportscars.
So this is all to say, don’t be shocked by men peeing outside.
Yes - a new Samsung 50” TV on-island (St Lucia) costs around $1200 US. I was able to buy in the US and ship (and pay duties and local taxes) for a bit under $800. Even at that price I was reluctant to do it, but my DH was livid the guests broke it and walked away, so I endured the hassle of AirCover mostly to keep him happy.
I agree that some hosts don’t seem to put value on their time when deciding whether to pursue a claim. Nor should we discount the stress involved, as that can take a real toll on people’s mental and physical health.
The irony, though, is that the things a lot of us would consider normal wear and tear- ruined linens, a broken coffee pot, etc, seem to be the things that take little effort to be compensated for, according to host posts I have read over the years. Like Airbnb will cough up $30 or $40 without a huge song and dance.
Whereas when hosts have had truly horrendous damages, hundreds or thousands of dollars, that most all hosts would consider worth trying to be compensated for, it can take months of back and forths, only to often be told it’s considered normal wear and tear, or offered $30 for something that will cost $300 to repair or replace, due to “depreciation”.
I’m sure Airbnb’s time-consuming claims process is designed to lead hosts to give up, so I do appreciate when hosts stick with it, despite the frustration. If Airbnb refuses to hold a real security deposit from guests and charge them if necessary, they need to be responsible for the damages caused by awful guests who refuse to take responsibility themselves. Or stop the false advertising about how AirCover has hosts’ backs.
Hi
That’s a pain but I am pretty sure that will pull out, like car panels
Glue sticks are one method but YouTube has loads of solutions. Do not despair. All is not lost
My husband hit my new car a while back and got a cheap dent puller. It worked fine on the car and various banged up metal stuff (he restores motorcycles and tractors), I’d expect it would work on a stainless fridge, it’s just a big panel. $18 on amazon.
Wow thank you everyone for the suggestions and support. So far my attempts have been unsuccessful (plunger, simple and cheap dent remover locking plunger type of thing from
big box store, and the hairdryer/keyboard air compressor suggestion). I’m still going to try dry ice and a more sophisticated dent repair kit with the glue gun and slide hammer. I love the idea of a magnet but my dent is also too low to be covered. Now I did find some fridge “wrapping” options online that I could be buy for like $30. One looks like stainless steel and I wonder if it’s the same coating that was on my last fridge, which was electric and only came in fake stainless steel? It seems like this could be a solution to the current dent as long as it doesn’t show the indentation.
Ours was too, which made me wonder whether something was in someone’s back pocket and they backed into it (ours is French doors, so could happen from two directions).
Thank you. I have since found at least one way to improve. In our manual the sheet is reproduced with directional bearings, indicating which way is N-S-E-W.
