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We have a mountain cabin near Lake Lure, NC. We went through the hurricane with one felled tree that damaged a stairway (rarely used by guests) and a few feet of fascia and gutter on the porch overhang.
Power is out and anticipated to be back on within two weeks. While cabin property is in good shape, two of the major attractions in the area, Lake Lure and Chimney Rock were decimated by flooding. At this time, the convenient grocery store (15 minutes away) is not accessible by a direct route… the nearest grocery store is now 25 minutes away.
We have multiple guest reservationsover the next month, one within the 2 week power outage.
We are keeping them informed of the status… the advice we need is on refunds… our leaning is on giving full refunds if requested, even for the guests who took the “no refund discount” option…Advice?
Also, had anyone had experience with how FEMA and SBA deal with AirBnBs in the disaster relief programs?
I would certainly give full refunds in such a case. Golden rule and all. And those guests may very well book with you again in the future, which they certainly won’t do if you keep their money when there’s no power and major inconveniences, just because they had a non-refundable booking.
The purpose of non-refundable policies is that the guest can’t just change their mind about coming and expect any refund. It’s not designed in order for a host to refuse to refund if they can’t provide what they promised.
I suspect that if hosts refuse to refund under the circumstances (no power, local services and attractions non-functional or limited) and guests call Airbnb, they are going to get refunded anyway. Better that you look like the good guy before they have to phone Airbnb.
The Extentuating Circumstances refund policy says guests aren’t entitled to refunds for weather events that are common to the area at certain times of year, like booking in Miami during hurricane season, or booking in Minnesota in January. Guests bear the risk of a hurricane or a blizzard in those situations.
But no one could have anticipated flood conditions in NC unprecedented in 300 years.
Full refunds, no questions asked. Offer it up now. The last thing your area needs is guests and tourists taking up much-needed resources for locals.
Your area needs help. FEMA and insurance will pay you to rent out your cabin to a family in need of housing.
I already have LTR from last year’s Hurricane Idalia, otherwise I’d be taking in my neighbors. The home my “kids” had under escrow is totaled, so now they’re back to searching for another house and very thankful they hadn’t closed yet, otherwise they’d have been without insurance and without a home and without any money.
Offer your home up. There are local real estate agencies that will put you in touch with the County to get people (paying people, your neighbors) into your cabin. Get a lease.
Reminds me of when Covid hit. Responsible hosts were of the mind “Of course you get a full refund. Not only are normal travel operations shut down or limited, and lockdowns in place in many areas, we don’t want to encourage people to travel and spread this virus around.”
Then there were the hosts totally outraged because Airbnb was issuing full refunds without question, demanding that guests should pay 50%, since a pandemic and Covid restrictions weren’t the host’s “fault”.
They refused to acknowledge that the guests had paid for a service they couldn’t and shouldn’t avail themselves of, whereas the hosts are running a business, in which there is no guaranteed income and they should have had some contingency plan for when unforeseen things happen, which are no one’s fault, but certainly not “fair” for the guests to shoulder any financial loss over.
I guess in CA we could say fire season is all refundable. If there were a fire event here, I certainly would wish my guests to leave> Bon Voyage and >here’s your full refund for unused days and inconvenience!
