Guest walks out of Airbnb and wants full refund

[IgglePiggleLovesUpsey]

I've had a bit of a crap day today tbh and the icing on the cake has been having to liaise with Airbnb support - I feel I have gone over so many details regarding a guest that decided to leave early due to issues with my property and now wants full refund.- so naturally I have come here to go over it again.

Timeline

• guests confirms that she and her partner will be using property only but would like use of spare bedroom. 2 adults
• I inform guest some building work has taken place to access loft eg new staircase and loft hatch, it's not quite finished so please avoid the area. She says it's fine.

• Guest arrives, is shown round property, then mentions she will be returning and bringing 3yo. They return, order takeaway, use bathroom etc and then contact Airbnb support to complain about property and say they want to leave citing hygiene and safety as issue. They don't cancel reservation.
• Airbnb contact me, back and forth we go, I want to know what the issue is exactly and be shown photos but they aren't shared.

I call, I message etc and eventually I reach out to guest asking to clarify issues and if she has left of intending to, only then do I find out she left that night. By this point I've stayed away for 2 nights and have packed all my stuff expecting them to stay for 11 nights. I think it's cheeky for them to expect a full refund when they made use of the facilities, didn't indicate they had any issues when being shown around, cost me time and effort to prep for their arrival , lied about number of guests and never even informed anyone they had left.

Or am I unreasonable? They found one small screw on the floor...so they felt it was unsafe for the child...the one we didn't know was going to be there. Also I forgot to check behind the TV stand...there was a clean coffee lid and a light switch to the loft in the area they were asked to avoid wasn't screwed back. I wiped clean the mirrors one last time before leaving and the tissue was referred to as 'trash' left lying around and bathroom slippers suddenly counted as shoes left lying around. The only issue I accept wasn't ideal was that a cupboard - that was not for the use of the guests but had the door removed and was leaning against cupboard.

I agree with others, I wouldn’t of wanted to stay here either, doesn’t sound like a nice environment and would of left the same day. Please give them a full refund and not leave dirty tissues, screws and slippers lying around in future.

She probably thought she would be blamed in the end for all the itemised problems she found, so decided to leave immediately. This was smart of her.

People expect a pristine property with almost hotel like features from an AirBnB, not a work in progress with slippers, a tissue, a coffee lid, a missing cupboard door, or unfinished electricals.

I think you should refund her and use it as a lessons learned. Then rent again only when the property is finished.

Of course you should refund her!

Yes, a pair of recently brought flips flops, not worn in any other room, I guess I got so used to the idea of bathroom slippers growing up I forget it's not the cultural norm in this country. It's handy to have them as it means if any water gets on the floor it doesn't need to get on your feet and you don't end up damping carpets in other rooms. Have a shoes off policy in the whole house to reduce dirt from outside.

It was pretty cheap I'd say, cheaper than anything else in the area, it was walking distance from a London train station, 2 bed mid Victorian terrace house, all the kitchen to use and facilities, netflix...
I've always thought the real benefit of booking Airbnb is the amount of money you save from self catering, convenience of being able to wash your own clothes, privacy and extra space. Surely if you want hotel standard of fluffy slippers wrapped in plastic she would easily be paying 3x as much.

I think the phrase building work actually makes it sound like a lot more dangerous than it was, in reality a new set of stairs Had been put in which had been finished before guests arrived, there was a light switch further up the stairs that would be used to turn the light on in the loft and therefore doesn't need to be used by guest.

I agree it doesn't look great and ofcourse the plan was to have even this one screw fitted in before guests arrived but builder left it undone.

do you have a disclaimer in the blurb, some places i have seen have this

This option was offered to them, I told them about the stairs and the loft about a week before arrival, asked if they would still be ok to go ahead, at that point I was worried a wall would be left unpainted, turns out that the job was completed before they arrived just the hatch to the loft hadn't been painted nicely - again a part of the house that wasn't listed as part of the booking so shouldn't affect their stay.

This is my point exactly!

Why didn't she mention anything while being shown around eg..I'm bringing a small child with me later on, I don't like the look of those stairs'. We live with a toddler and had a stair gate ready to fit and would have installed it had we known.

Secondly, once realising they didn't like the idea of staying in someone's home - I thought that's what Airbnb started as but never mind - then they could have contacted me and I'd have offered them a refund as I could appreciate it's not ideal with a toddler....but instead they spent a couple hours chilling out, ordering a takeaway , eating, napping and watching TV.
And to me it's odd that I asked twice is it definitely just two adults staying and each time she said yes.She then, after the issue was raised said the child wasn't going to spend the night with them but just brought over for change. Now I'm wondering do people go to visit family for 11 days and leave their 3yo in a separate house with family while they sleep in a 2 bed property? Sounds more likely she didn't want to pay an additional £20 for an extra guest. ...which is she had just said my extra guest is my child, please can you I not be charged for him? I'd have happily waived it

That light switch needed to be screwed on properly regardless of whether they needed to use it or not. Were the stairs cordoned off? You shouldn’t have any exposed wires like that in a rental property.

I won’t stay too….

i would want my money back asap

Thing is OP, if there are dirty tissues lying around it makes you wonder about the cleanliness of things that you can't see. And she wasn't to know that it was a tissue you'd used to clean a mirror - it could have been anything.

A pair of your slippers left lying around, dirty tissue, discarded coffee lid, exposed light switch and unfinished building work - that's not a property in any fit state to rent out.

Clean and safe isn't much to ask really. Whether she tried to sneak a toddler in is neither here nor there.

If you're going to make money from renting your home out, you can't go about it half-arsed. Lessons learnt for next time, perhaps.

The air BnBs ive stayed in have all been spotless. Although you think you're mentioning "little" things, all those things combined would leave me unhappy.

They may seem like 'small things' but collectively build a picture of something bigger- unclean and unsafe.

You should never have let it whilst there was unfinished work.

Give her a full refund.

No way would I have stayed there either. Refund!

If you’re renting your house out in this state do you have adequate insurance? Are you breaching any air bnb rules here re health and safety? She should have declared the child at booking, lots of places don’t accept toddlers so maybe that’s why she didn’t mention it. But your wrong here is much worse!

What position would you be in
legally both with your home insurance and air bnb if there’d been an accident?

I've stayed at AirBnBs where hosts have kept their stuff on site but it's locked away, in a cupboard.

I think that your customers had a think about the state of your property after you showed them around and decided, on balance, to keep their toddler safe, it wasn't worth the risk. Also, if you are an AirBnB host you have to keep your property spotless. If I was in your customers' shoes I probably would have left and demanded a refund too.

In hospitality you have to bring your A-game or not bother.

That switch thing pictured upthread is very dangerous if young children are there, they could put their fingers in it. I would want a refund

Unsafe electrics and an unsafe cupboard door are not small things, if they cause injury to a guest you are liable. Tissues left also aren’t a small thing, it shows somewhere isn’t being cleaned properly.

They likely said it was okay on arrival as they had nowhere else to stay, so had essentially no choice but to stay one night while they booked an alternarive airbnb or hotel.

We have an airbnb attached to our property, like you we have to follow rules set out by airbnb, our insurance company and any local legislation. Electrics being safe and fit for purpose is a requirement of both our insurance and airbnb.

Sorry OP but I’m with the guest on this one. YABU.

I wouldn't want to stay there either. A property with unsafe wiring, a broken cupboard door and rubbish on the floor isn't suitable for rental.

Your property shouldn’t have been available to let whilst building work was going on. You should have blocked your letting calendar until it was perfectly ready and completely checked for safety. You were remiss not to do that.
So how come this guest was able to even book it in the first place ?

The property is either perfectly clean and safe with all work finished and available for booking, or it’s not. There is no in-between for obvious health and safety reasons.

Therefore OP, the fault automatically lies with you and you have very little come back.

You feel this guest has been cheeky and acted with bad intentions which may or may not be true, but your unfinished property shouldn’t have been available to her in the first place in the unfinished, unsafe, unchecked state it was in. You knew it was unfinished and still allowed a booking to take place. Furthermore, you allowed a child to enter.

It’s your responsibility, nobody else’s, (certainly not the responsibility of the paying guest) to ensure its absolute safety. You shouldn’t have placed yourself in this position and, having been caught out, you are still refusing to be accountable when the onus is clearly on you, the property owner.

Accepting a toddler into that environment was very irresponsible. Be glad that nothing worse happened.

Going forward, understand all your letting responsibilities fully and with certainty, and don’t forget to make sure you have the correct insurance.

I wouldn’t have stayed either. The tissue could have been used for anything, how would she know? Unfinished works, random flip flops lying around, dirty tissue, screw on the floor, cupboard door off and lying around. It’s not great.