We recently stayed in an Airbnb house in Italy. The house was very big, very old, lots of rooms and furniture, most of it well-used - it's clearly been a family house for a long time.
Shortly after we left, the host sent me a message accusing us of breaking a chest of drawers (she sent me a photo of a crack on the side of it) and said the whole thing would have to be replaced. I told her quite truthfully that we had not caused that damage.
She's taken this through the Airbnb damage process and they've decided we have to pay for it. They say that because we didn't report the damage as soon as we checked in, they 'cannot exclude' our responsibility. They keep going on about how we should have 'notified the host of the problem immediately' or 'canncelled our reservation' so Airbnb could have helped us find an alternative house. As if we would have done either of these over a small crack in the side of a piece of furniture we weren't using!
The policy seems absurd to me - are we really supposed to have gone around the house and made a list of every crack or small imperfection and send it to airbnb for our own protection? If so, they really need to make this clear at time of booking. It also seems contrary the general principle that if you're going to accuse someone of damage, you need to be able to prove it.
Does anyone have any advice on what i can do here? As it stands, they're going to charge my card several hundred pounds whether I agree or not.