Praise be to Airbnb! - and no, this is not been said ironically!

[Poppy]

I really feel it is time to say thank you to Airbnb. Regular forum members know I have had a couple of tricky guests lately.

Guest left 5 minutes after checking in saying it was too small and not good value

I had last minute guests check in at 6pm last night for two nights. They paid $225 a night, that is a low price as it is $360 on weekends and I had dropped the price to get a booking. It has 117 5* reviews and 117 5* for accuracy. It is very large and beautiful, bordering on luxury. It was a 2 bedroom unit and it has been renovated for only a couple, so it’s huge. With a large alfresco dining, BBQ, spa area. A separate bedroom, a gym room full of equipment, a couch that seats 8, a full kitchen …

I seem to be having a bad run!

I had a guest check in last night and complain about the standard of the cleaning. I had been there the day before and it was spotless. I apologised and said I would send the cleaner around immediately to address the issues and she would stay there until they were happy. The cleaner drove half an hour to get there, the guest had a light like a CSI light on his phone and a magnifying glass! They had gone through the bed and found an eyelash. The back of the throw on the bed had tiny tiny sprinkl…

I would like to say that Airbnb have been awesome and supportive in both situations.
So, a big thank you to their sensible customer service team who work in a job that none of us would ever want to.

[Malagachica]

I actually phoned Customer Service for the first time a couple of days ago and was surprised after all I’d heard here and elsewhere to get a very sensible and competent -seeming young woman who sorted things out for me straight away.

Do you think it’s possible to ask for the same CS rep by name if I have a problem again?

[Poppy]

I am now asking for names the last one’s was Luv, she was very sweet. She did say she would follow up with a message with her name on it and she did. Generally they are lovely (pun intended), I think the issue hosts have is the lack of consistently in their answers rather than their attitude. They have a shocking job and I am impressed at how they keep their cool. Then there is also the fact that they make the final judgment on a situation (and that’s the way it has to be) and it’s not always in the hosts favour.

I am lucky that both my recent issues went in my favour. However, one of the guests did mention in the review that she was offered $100. So I presume that came out of Airbnb’s pocket as I didn’t know anything about it until I read about it in the review.

[JamJerrupSunset]

You think that’s their real name?

[Poppy]

I actually think it is! I think it’s their English name, I have a friend who works with two nurses from Asia called: Life and Lovely…

[Poppy]

She works at Frankston hospital.

[JohnF]

While not a telephone call, the first contact we had with CS was fairly decent via email.

We then got a message asking if we’d be happy for that person to deal with any future issues, to which we agreed.

Sure enough, next time we had a problem we got “our Tania” She was the one who, when a guest wanted a bad review removed, came down on our side. Told the guest to do one, so to speak.

JF

[Annet3176]

I’ve had good experiences four of the times I’ve needed assistance. One time was very frustrating because the CS rep couldn’t understand that I wasn’t cancelling a reservation, I was moving them to my larger condo, but it escalated appropriately and I was correctly assisted.

[justMandi]

We had something go amazingly well this summer with a guest that was very ill. Another guest was a doctor and she dropped everything after a 24 hour shift to attend to him. I called ABB CS to spread the good news, and the dude said “Wow, I really needed to hear that!” Tough job.

BTW the sick guest recovered, but the doctor was suspicious and urged him to follow it up.

When it works, it works beautifully.