It happened to me too…but i knew exactly what was going on. I knew who complained on me.
Because same night I complained on her . Airbnb said that this is their policy. As soon as they get complain they must temporarily disable your account .
Sometimes they forget about you.
You can do 2 things: open another account
And advertise with other sources. There is an option to link calendars with other platforms.
My biggest success is Craigslist. I think that I have more safety with guests from there than with Air. I have a chamce to see a person, I never give an answer to a guest without checking his records first. It takes me few minutes but at least I know there is no evictions or criminal records.
I had twice to say no to people who had evictions.
With Airbnb I had quite a few nutcases. and drugies actually using on my property.
Airbnb or no Airbnb its always good idea to not rely in one source of income.
With Craigslist you also can find longer term guests like one week or more .
Goid news. Lesson learnt for you to chase daily or more when siomething is so important for your livelihood @Mark_Mark
The Safety Dept shut me down after 5 yrs of Super Hosting and referred me to a rule about cameras that has nothing to do with my account. I had previously talked to an Airbnb case manager that assured me my doorbell and entryway cameras were allowed and my listing clearly stated who and why people were being videod as they came onto my property. (Austin has a super strict short term renter policy on number of guests allowed) I responded to the Safety Dept with details and photos. They responded with their right to to delete me. All attempts to contact the dept have been ignored. I still dont know why thy did this. Five years of glowing 5 star reviews are gone.
What did you do?
Does anyone at Airbnb care about their Superhosts who work hard to make Airbnb work? Anything I can do? Im handicapped now and I depend on Airbnb income to survive. I didnt do anything wrong. Any help you can give me is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Karen Armstrong
Austin Texas
CAN ANYONE HELP ME GET A LEGITIMATE REASON WHY MY 5YR SUPER HOST LISTING WAS BANNED?
Anyone know how to find out what happened? This happened to me when I was out of state for the holidays. I called Airbnb in December with issues with a 31 day guest. Two Airbnb case managers said the case was closed in my favor, I was within my rights to video record anyone coming into or leaving my home, my listing clearly stated this and that it was to comply with Austin’s strict STR laws, and the cameras were in plain sight. This guest hacked my security system, installed so much electronic equipment it blew out a circuit (cost me $500 to replace with larger breaker, guest never mentioned he had anything that might be responsible) and blew out the pool pump! (broke the basket lid and tried to glue it and it failed and burned out my pump, $2000) This 30 day guest wanted to leave early because his kids cancelled on coming for the holidays so he no longer wanted a big home with a pool & hot tub by himself. The 40% discounted rate no longer applied so his 11 day refund was only $159. So he claimed that his privacy had been invaded. The message thread proved of all this , I put all facts in writing twice thinking Airbnb would realize their mistake. Still no response and Im banned from hosting, cant even get my tax information from Airbnb. They cancelled all my reservations and I dont know what to do? Their email refernced a section of the rules that totally exonerates me. Airbnb had the Vivint security system installed for free when I became a host.
Can anyone please help me?
Karen Armstrong
Austin Texas
Your lucky, Airbnb deleted my listing and cancelled all my reservations. Without my 200 5 star reviews it will be very difficult starting over on other sites. I worked very hard to get and keep my Super host status and did nothing to warrant loosing it. Does anyone have a way to contact Airbnb about this or anything I can do?
That sounds awful @SmTrzur - sometimes there is no logic to how they work
Try them on their social media @SmTrzur something like ‘Can you tell me why you suspended my account for having outside camera’s displayed in accordance with your T&C’
I am sure you are sadly realising it is never a great idea to rely on one marketing channel for your STR income particularly when you are dependent on the income.
Hopefully it’s just temporary but use this as an opportunity to list on other platforms and look at how you can market your listing directly through say a FB page and or website. You can use social media and paid ads to direct traffic to your page/website
This is a bit off topic, but this was recently changed; I just learned about it this week. Per the recent Texas Third Court of appeals, the City of Austin can no longer enforce the occupancy limit they once had. https://www.austintexas.gov/article/things-know-about-texas-third-court-appeals-ruling-and-short-term-rentals
I also had a superhost listing banned due to a neighbor complaint about a party (which had nothing to do with my unit but another unit on the same block). They said they would allow me to re-list after 30 days, it has been 45 and I can’t get a hold of anyone in the Trust and Safety dept. I’ve called the airbnb help desk every single day. It’s pretty frustrating, and I’ve lost thousands in potential bookings already.
Thank you for responding. So does this mean that STR permit occupancy limits no longer apply?
And yes, I can and will list on other platforms but without my 200+ 5 star reveiws many guests are hesitant to book my home. I worked very hard at being a great superhost for 5 yrs on Airbnb. I’m thinking of asking for arbitration and getting a lawyer. Airbnb cancelled all my 2020 reservations for no valid reason. They wont even give me the courtesy of telling me exactly why they banned me. This last guest hacked my securuty system, accessed locked areas clearly marked as owner only, installed enough electronics to blow my circuirt breaker ($500 to replace with larger breaker and 2 service calls to identify problem because guest faile to mention the room full of monitors, equipment and extension cords were installed the day the power went out!; didnt pay the pool heating bill as agreed, and broke my pool pump!! ($2000 replacement after he tried to glue lid he broke failed and blew out my pump, a new lid would have been $100). Yet somehow Airbnb believed a guest with only 2 reviews that I have hidden cameras and invaded his privacy! There are no and never were any hidden cameras. All my guests are made well arware of the entry cameras and the reasons they are necessay. After staying 20 of his 31 day reservation he suddenly thinks his privacy was invaded? This is absurd and Airbnb reacted by banning me! There are 2 pages of notes, texts and pictures that exhonerate me. This guest wanted a refund for personal reasons and lied to get it. Yes, i should not have depended on Airbnb for my sole source of income, but that doesnt excuse Airbnb’s abusing their hosts with no accountabilty for their actions. I have one of only 2500 STR permits in Austin. Yet AIRBNB lists over 10,000 homes. Im going to go to work for the City Code Marshall to help get Airbnb banned from operating in Austin. Companies with such awful.ethics and business practices should be banned until they learn to take responsibilty for their mistakes instead of ignoring them. I see complaints all over the internet that Airbnb ignores hosts as a solution to issues they dont want to deal with. Its truly sad that a company that started out with so much promise has become a totally unethical, for profit only driven company. Shame on them!
I wont go down without a fight because this is simply wrong!! Hosts need to be warned. Copy all your reviews and listing verbage so you dont have to start all over with nothing. Airbnb can ban anyone at any time no mater how good a host you are. Airbnb expects all hosts to be responsible and ethical, yet they dont hold the same standards for themselves. They dont honor there word, (2 airbnb case managers told me this issue was resolved in my fVor and case was closed, then safety dept deleted my listing and has ignored all my emails and calls. Airbnb doesnt understand or care how much they hurt their hosts who depend on this income.
Thanks for listening. Ill keep you posted on having my day in court. Better than simply blogging complaints, I intend to do something. I see on line there is talk of a class action suit as well. Airbnb once asked me to speak on their behalf to the Austin City Council. I’m informing the city counsel that I now withdraw ALL my prior statements. Airbnb doesn’t serve the Austin community well or help homeowners afford their homes, they do not support hosts uphold the STR laws and do not honor their words & promises or take responsibility for their mistakes. Ignoring issues is not good business practices. Google Airbnb complaints, I wish I had before it happened to me.
HOSTS BEWARE!!
I hope the other short term rental websites are more ethical and fair than Airbnb. Im making my own website now and not depending on other platforms. Luckily some of my past guests have called when they couldnt find my listing. Untill now I never let anyone book off Airbnb. I thought I owed allegence to Airbnb. Foolish of me.
Again thanks for listening. Im hoping someone with influence or ability to contact Airbnb will bring this to their attention. Surely someone at Airbnb has the brains and ethics to correct this terrible mistake. At minimum I hope Ive helped other hosts to avoid this problem. Please protect yr listings and diversify.
Kind regards,
Karen
Naive yes, foolish no. Definitely not.
We started out with Airbnb, then added BDC and HA. We tried a few others, but didn’t have much success.
Airbnb now accounts for less than 40% of our business, and even that figure is falling. I’m not unhappy with that given the arbitrary way they deal with hosts.
This is all purely anecdotal, but a good tactic appears to be that you first target them directly via social media, twitter and facebook initially.
If still no joy, prepare a press release (unemotional and professional) but do not issue it; once you do that you lose any leverage it may give you. Send it to Airbnb and see what happens.
JF
This is another similarity we have with the rideshare driver community of which I was briefly a member (besides frustrations over the rating system). Uber drivers frequently complain on forums about being shut down with no explanation, only to find out 2 months later some scammer falsely reported them for (insert egregious infraction) to get a free ride. The driver community has responded to these frustrations by forming unions in certain cities. In most places, as with our community, the supply of drivers/hosts is ample and the company doesn’t miss anything when a host/driver with 500 5-star reviews and no prior complaints is suddenly shut down because of a false claim or glitch in The Matrix.
Many hosts find the best way to fight this is to complain on Air’s FB site.
John,
Thank you for your great advice and kindness in responding.
Two quick questions:
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Do you have an address, email or some effective way to send a press release to Airbnb that may have a chance of being read? Airbnb does not respond to emails or letters sent to their San Francisco address on Google. I no longer have any host access to contact anyone.
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Do you know if my listing would still be available somehow, or once deleted is it gone and unrecoverable. Given the current issues with the virus, I understand I will never be compensated for their mistake. My only hope at this time is to recover my listing and all the wording I used. I am having a difficult time duplicating my listing. It evolved over 5 years and took many many hours to create.
Like most hosts, I will have a lot of time now. But if there is no way to recover any of my listing, I’ve already wasted enough time. As Airbnb’s terrible treatment of their hosts starts to affect their profits, maybe they will rethink their poor business practices. Doubt they will ever recover from this, given the number of hosts who no longer view their partnership with Airbnb favorably.
Thanks again. Stay safe and healthy!
Karen
Does anyone know my listing exists somewhere? If not I Airbnb cannot make this right even if they wanted to. I see on line their poor treatment of their hosts is starting to affect their profits. Maybe they will now have reason to rethink some of their policy and procedures and make some much needed changes.
There might be a partial cached version somewhere. Here’s one source. There are also sites that “scrape” Airbnb listings, I have no idea how often they update. I’m really not an expert on IT, maybe someone else will chime in.
With great sympathy for your situation, no one can say this with any confidence. Sure lots of hosts are mad and are predicting horrible things for Airbnb but some of that is just wishing. Some folks need to be careful what they wish for.
The other thing I want to say is that this is terrible timing for you. Airbnb is absolutely deluged and no one is going to care about a host that was unfairly removed from the platform. I truly think something like a press release on your issue is a waste of time, but as you said you will have lots of it now.
I think you should use your time to build your own website, make your own promotional materials and make your own way in the world of vacation rentals. If that’s not what you want to do then maybe you will get a chance to open a new Airbnb account and start again at the beginning.
Best of luck.
@SmTrzur Try just typing the name of your listing into Google. Some young tenants of my neighbors’ were Airbnbing my neighbors’ home while they were out of the country without their knowledge and I found the ad on Google, by typing in the name of the listing she had used, even though the tenants had already removed it from the Airbnb site.
I busted the tenants and notified the neighbors after one of the Airbnb guests had come down my road, lost, looking for “XX’s house” as it was listed on Airbnb. When confronted by the neighbor, the tenant totally denied listing it, which is when I went to see if I could find it and sent the link to the neighbors as proof she was lying.
I also had proof my tenants were listing illegal and was getting threats from my HOA of being fined. Tenant kept relisting it so I called Airbnb, they referred my case to legal who still has my case in their inbox, unopened and marked URGENT. That was
2 yrs ago and it’s still pending, unopened
But it was my legally permitted Super Host listing on my home they deleted with a vague reference about hidden cameras, which I have never had. Still can not get anyone at Airbnb to tell me what happened or why they cancelled all my reservations.