Yeah I didn’t tell them that. I was just trying to make a point of, even IF I was racist it still wouldn’t have made sense. I’m a minority in my country. I’m in a mixed race relationship. My children (from a previous marriage) are mixed as well. I know what it’s like to be discriminated against. To suggest that I would discriminate because of race is just gut wrenching. Especially coming from some most likely privileged white man.
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Exactly his intent…
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You had me until “most likely privileged white man”.
Understand you are upset but still…
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There’s nothing you should or can do. Isabelle is just giving you a slap on the wrist. If there was proof or evidence that you discriminated against a guest based on their race, your account would’ve already been suspended or removed.
Was your review actually removed or did this come in retaliation to your review? Did your review contain anything about race?
In your thread two weeks ago, I suggested standing up and fighting back against this guest. I received quite a bit of criticism for that but I still think that was/is the best course of action. The bully won’t stop until confronted.
If I’m putting two and two together here, it sounds like your guest has completely ‘taken the gloves off’ and is trying to sabotage your character by being a smartypants and throwing whatever will stick at you.
If he really did make this up just to get back at you, printing out that email and mailing it to the HR department or Ethics office at his place of employment along with an explanation of how it started would be extremely embarrassing. He would have to explain why he claimed to be Latino and refused to pay for his family breaking things and vomiting in a house he rented. Like I said before, when he stayed at your home he represented his company because he actually told you he represents his company. He brought that into the picture so you’re not hitting below the belt.
I would never ever make any comment about race because to me that’s not a factor on a guest’s behavior. My review was exactly as someone had helped me write on here. I copied and pasted. I believe it was @Brandt that wrote it. I can’t imagine he could have misheard or misunderstood anything I said as possibly racially related. Especially considering this claim came in shortly after I left him his review makes me believe he’s just angry after reading what I wrote of him. If I said something to him, it would have had to be from 2 weeks ago. Why didn’t he claim it then?
I’m guessing you don’t know the backstory. This man repeatedly threw at me the fact he’s a CFO (Chief Financial Officer) of some large company and told me to look at his profile on LinkedIn. He repeatedly used his status to threaten me, and told me that due to his position (and his wife’s position), they are always “lawyered up”. He told me that he will call his lawyer because I asked for him to pay for $83 of damages. Now he’s using a race card against ME, a minority in this country. If you think I overstepped because of my words after his words against me, then I don’t know what to say. I have NEVER declined a single reservation after 1.5 years with Air BnB (3 properties) and NEVER canceled a single reservation. I don’t even think about what race the guests are. This man repeatedly brought up his status to threaten me and when he didn’t win, he made up a fictitious story to smear my image. But like I said, if you can’t see where I’m coming from, then I don’t know what to say.
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Sounds like an a**. Best to just forget him and move on. Some people are just jerks. No use in letting it get to you.
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I think you need to reply to Isabelle’s email. Point out you had only one request for damages for the relatively small sum of $xx …attach your photos of the damage …that you are a superhost, your guests mention repeatedly what a good host you are (dig out samples from the reviews) and let it show that you are quite hurt by this insinuation. Ask them to call you and to discuss this with you.
Point out you do IB …don’t require ID etc etc
Insist that they make a note of this on the dude’s profile as other hosts might suffer the same vindictive crap from this Thumbs Down guest.
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I did respond to Isabelle, and told her how hurt and disappointed I was with Air BnB for believing the guest’s false claims. Isabelle told me that this is just what they are supposed to do when the guest makes a complaint and that I’m just getting a “warning” which doesn’t affect my status blah blah blah and even told me that I just need to make sure it doesn’t become a “pattern”! Her response made me SICK. A Warning is an indication that they think I did something wrong. And her suggesting that I don’t make this a pattern further shows she thinks I did something wrong. Then she also said that I need to make sure I don’t take any retaliatory action. Wow. I have stuck to the truth this whole time. Mark LIED LIED AND LIED SOME MORE and wrote me a retaliatory review full of lies. But Air Bnb is going to ask ME not to retaliate. Just wow. I couldn’t even finish reading Isabelle’s response. It made me want to hurl. I responded to Isabelle and told her why don’t she issue a warning to the guest who threatened me and damaged items. No response from her. Nada.
I did read the back story. He is a jerk.
I dislike the “privileged white man” stereotype just as much as I dislike “a lazy____” or “a drunken ___” or “an excitable ____” any other sweeping statement. (All of which have been attached to my ethnic group.) These statements can be both descriptive of a particular individual AND and an excuse to label any in a group. I see it diminishing the offense by categorizing it - almost as if he couldn’t help it because he is a white guy.
I’m sure many will disagree with me but I am sure we all agree he behaved very badly and none of us would want to host such a jerk. I am sorry you experienced this.
It makes sense. Thanks for explaining to me. And thanks for making me feel better… =)
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Reading this thread makes me wonder whether I should support ABB by being one of their hosts. On the information available and in my judgement that happilytorn has told it as it happened, I can’t understand why ABB would treat her so badly. The sequence of events demonstrate clearly there is reasonable doubt that this jerk’s claims are spurious. So why are ABB not seeing this.
Fortunately we have never had a really bad guest, so I’m wondering if there is a procedure whereby happilytorn can escalate her dialogue with ABB and perhaps get an ABB manager to intervene and maybe see the situation as it really is? Is there any recourse for hosts (maybe even collectively) to feedback to ABB that treating hosts in this manner is bad practice and unacceptable.
No.
You can but its a waste of time.
Exactly. Its just like I told you. There’s nothing you can do and there’s nothing you should do. This is just a game. Play the game. I know its hard because its very personal, offensive and emotional but Airbnb is looking at this from a purely logical and policy standpoint. The best way to get the outcome you want is to treat it the same way. I’m sure you’ll never have this problem again because you’ve learned so much about how to protect yourself against guests like this. So in reality this won’t affect you one way or another and you should jut keep on doing what you do. The other option is leave Airbnb I suppose.
So my awful guest wrote"The heater was in the room and it was a lot of noise, it was impossible to sleep and if you turn it off you die of cold. We found the apartment quite dirty when we arrived so we had to clean it and buy our own sheets because they were full of shit, the same with towels. It is very far from the center and the bus is expensive, it is certainly more profitable to rent something better on airbnb."
And I responded:
Hello Maria, thank you for your review. We have now replaced the door that you smashed and the paint matched perfectly, thank goodness. AirBnB were great in helping us with the money for that. The stench of smoke has also left the flat after much cleaning. I wish you had noticed it is a no smoking property, but never mind we have cleaned it thoroughly, walls, floor, furniture. I will let our professional laundry know about the linen, so sorry to learn now that you had to buy your own. You should have mentioned it to us when you were there, or when you left with effusive praise for my home. Sorry you wont be staying with us again. You are right though, it is probably better you stay somewhere else. Best wishes for the future. Anna. Oh, and that big stain came out of the rug, lucky huh! Cheers
Of course the damage was done - because we are just newish, her all 1 star rating put us below the Super Host threshold and I lost my status for (hopefully) a few months.
Bless the little rotters heart.
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I hope you wrote all this on her review because writing it as a response has zero effect on her. (not that a review has much effect either but…)
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I hear you. I wanted to smash her on the review about her for other hosts. Mainly to warn them about her…really bad guest. She punched three holes through a wooden door for goodness sake…and lets not mention the smoking. However the circumstances were difficult. She wanted my co host and I to lie to an insurance company about how the damage happened so she could make a claim on them to pay for the door. We point blank refused. In the meantime I was negotiating with Airbnb to pay because it was clear she was Bull********. this went on and on - the communication with her and I was trying to be accommodating so Airbnb would be happy as well. Airbnb did pay to its credit to replace the door. She left her review with minutes to spare, and I got the reply in. Went to write one about her on the other page and it had expired. Also the one who caused the damage was not the one whose name it was booked under.
Well, on it goes. She clearly knows how to exploit gullible hosts and she’ll keep riding the train until it stops.
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@GentleHart, thank you. i really wish ABB would change their setup. I’m seriously considering leaving the platform. I get very good business from them, but I worry the day someone else will make up some lies and they will suspend my account instantly and I will lose all future bookings without a chance to even speak. It worries me a lot and I lose sleep because of it at night. I manage these cabins for someone else (as stated before) but I do get paid and my pay is dependent on how well I do. This is my only source of income… I’m a single mom with 2 small children… (Until I get married later this year of course).
the reply has a bigger window. I don’t know how long. But I really wish you had reviewed her and blocked her…
I’m so sorry to hear this has happened to you. I think your response would be helpful to your future potential guests.