Airbnb reviews

I had a great experience in Cambria California with my hosts. Prices were fair and it seemed affordable then. Ever since then, every time we planned a trip, i found prices on airbnb to be equal or even higher than hotels. By hotels I don't mean cheap, dirty, bed bugs infested hotels. I go thru as much reviews as I can from different sites on hotels to compare wuality and price. Cleanness is important to me, more than saving a few dollars. But bnb sites in S.F., Portland, Seattle were found to he way overpriced once you factor in cleaning fees, additional fees per extra person (s), etc. Having the comfort of a "home" to yourself is important, but while on vacation, who stays indoors except for shower n sleep??? I am very disappointed in how greedy the hosts are now on airbnb. Checked it our so many times last half yesr n this year for vacation plans for this summer that I think ai might not bother with airbnb anymore.

I will not use this site to book a B&B ever again. There needs to be far more accountability. My husband and I arrived at our Bed and Breakfast and was shocked! It should have been called NO BED and NO BREAKFAST. My chickens live in a cleaner and nicer shed than the one we stayed in for five days. The "bed," was a dirty foamy thrown on the floor and I cringe every time I think of the smell of the sheets and blankets. OMG - it was disgusting! The toilet was outside with a dirty sheet strung up for "privacy." The shower was wide open with no enclosure whatsoever. I'll leave you with some photos. You'll get the picture!

Booked and paid for a place to stay. Based on that, registered for a nonrefundable race, and then my reservation was canceled. Now all the places are sold out so I either eat the 120 cost for the race, pay twice as much to stay in the same area, or stay in the suburbs. Their response was it doesn't happen often and sent me places 10+ miles away to stay at.

Hours to pass their "strict verification" process : email, phone verifications, scans of ID documents (!! 8-o). As if it was not enough their require your social network connection AND all of your contacts!! Whatta excessive requirements?! They need a lot or your PRIVATE information - and all this to ALLOW you to PAY UPFRONT for your reservation?!? And then to get "Declined" answer from the host?! What an attitude to the client?! What is this "AIRBNB"? Closed private club?? I would say some kind of SCAM.

I am a single "adult" woman.over 50. I discovered to NEVER, EVER RENT FROM A SINGLE MALE.

My one experience was horrendous. The 28 yr old host was subletting a room when was subletting THE ONE BEDROOM APT. He slept on couch. NO amenities, joint bathroom with HIM and used sheets. Obviously disappointed when I arrived as an older woman, not a cute chick.His response to my inquiry. ( Sweet Alston! No problem. Swing on by (no pun intended) red light warning.

The creep is still renting a room. GIAN MICHAEL IN SALINAS, CA. I've since rented from women and couples with no problems..

1 million ID online.....Where are the worlds security services? ID and credit card online is the start for the perfect scam and more.
airbnb is NOT serious.
Nobody knows what it really is.

I rented a flat in Barcelona thru airbnb.com. I have checked the description of the flat very carefully and read all the reviews. People was generally happy in their reviews.
When I arrived, I got shocked. The flat has no any view. It's in the basement floor which probably was used to be a doorman quarter or a cellar. The window in the living room is facing to a wall. And the window in the bedroom is opening to the buildings hole. So, in the bedroom, you can very clearly hear almost all the neighbors, the barking dog on the first floor. It’s always so dark inside the flat..... And many other. In overall, I had a big disappointment.

After I turned back, they asked for a review. I spent my time and left a very descriptive feedback. After a while, I saw that they didn't make it public. When I asked them, they explained that the reviews are published only after both the host and guest have submitted theirs. So, you must expect the approval of the flat's host to make it public )))
It is really nonsense to expect the host to let a negative publicity for his/her flat. So, I understood why all the comments were good and positive for such flat.

Relatively easy to use and navigate. Not perfect but I gave it 5 stars because I found it by chance looking for a discount lodging site. Within an hour, I was able to get a bid on a place to stay that was 1/2 the price of a local motel 6 and looked twice as nice. Since then, I've used it 4 times, all with positive experiences even when I had to cancel. Highly recommended so long as you choose the right location & communicate with landlord in advance. Will definitely use again if on tight budget or looking for a personal touch like a B & B without need for a breakfast.

Really bad website. From a host point of view. They keep the full payment from the guest until the guest arrived to your place. They pay you the day after. However, we have not received payment yet from a guest that came and left for about 2 weeks now. We have been emailing them to no avail. No response. Just automated reply that says the same thing over and over. I would not recommend it to any one. They cannot be trusted, not one bit. They don't reply to you. They have no concern about you, except the money. STAY AWAY, AS A HOST AND AS A CUSTOMER. Once and issue arise, you will get NO HELP. NO HELP I TELL YOU.

TOTAL RIP OFF TO BOTH PARTIES

Supplier side: Accommodation owner
As a user and supplier this is the biggest con I have every encountered.
I supply accommodation and find I cannot communicate properly with my guests. Also I cannot control the type of person or have control over the bond issue. Its always a nightmare for entry and exit with guests. I am also inclined to cancel people who book through Airbnb last minute if i get a better offer as I dont know who they are or only get the money after they arrive. The follow up from airbnb is very poor - ie if there is damage they will not sort it out - its just too difficult. They also pay less than quoted - ie the rates quoted are less than paid out - then you also have to pay 3.8% paypal charge - huge fees. GUYS ALWAYS TALK TO THE OWNER FIRST. I HAVE HAD LOTS OF PEOPLE BOOK/PAY AND NOT EVEN AVAILABLE. OWNERS ARE LISTED ON LOTS OF OTHER SITES THEY PAY FOR SO TRY TO GOOGLE THEM ON THERE OWN SITE.
User side: Booking Airbnb accommodation
As a user I have to pay the total amount up front which is crazy. Never do this. I do not know what "trust accounts they have for this". I also never got my bond back - ever!!!. I also pay a year in advance and the owner only gets 1 day after i arrive. They sit on my money for a year, not on. The follow up is poor. Also accommodation owners are getting there email hijacked and you can pay someone else. You have no recourse, this is also happening on Tripadvisor and Flipkey. GUYS ALWAYS TALK TO THE OWNER BEFORE YOU GIVE YOUR MONEY OVER!!!!!.

Am I to understand that Airbnb takes money from our credit card and keeps it for sometimes months before we actually travel? What do they do with this money? I would understand a deposit and the balance to be paid a few weeks before arrival...but not the whole amount upfront. I didn't realize that Airbnb became a bank hoarding people's money making themselves interest.
I personally find this very disturbing and feel uncomfortable with how this payment system has been put in place.

This people are crooks! They take your money and will have no remorse and show know compassion after they get paid. They don't care and could care less if you get kicked out in the middle of the night on a cold and rainy when it's their own fault. Nobody was professional to try and contact me to clarify anything about my situation and when I called them, they we get rude and hang up on me. Im very disappointed and would not recommend them even to my worst enemies

I thought this was a great resource until my most recent experience in which the crazy homeowner wanted to charge us $700 for what she claimed was cigarette smoke damage. My husband smoked 50 feet away from the house and all the windows were closed yet she claims all the linens, drapes, etc were ruined and it would cost $700. AirBnb apparently did not need any proof from her about this and charged my card $200 (unbeknownst to me until I reviewed my credit card statement). I cancelled my account. I can find better deals and service elsewhere.

Be Careful they are scammers, no picture is true, bad reviews are removed!!!!
https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/262400?euid=b2b944b5-0035-bf8b-a435-b708b0dc3e54 - this is the advertisement.
And this is the reality: Basement, noisy, broken lights, no working stove, old microwave, dirty apartment, exposed wires, dark, bar outside and graffiti! Who knows how to complain? And they REMOVE bad reviews immediately ( we have seen one disappear in front of our eyes) and refuse to refund. They provide professional photographers to the owners - look at ours, it is a basement with no lights but you won't tell. What a bunch of liars....Can anyone tell me if there is a way to complain to the better business bureau?

Would give less had some guest came on property screaming ,cursing threading had to call police and we had called Air BnB 3 times and he calls in after he left before cops came to arrest and air BnB tried to trick me into cancell the reservation. THAT WOULD GIVE HIM EVERY BUCK BACK!!!!! Sorry would not fall for it ,thanks for looking out for the host. Also they froze the payment as they said there was a personality disagreement so they would release my money. Use flip key, vrbo and homeaway but stay away from this place they are the worst.

Damages discovered after the 48 hour deadline will not get considered by airbnb and further, airbnb will not amend or take down your review. Hosts be aware there are some reviews out there that the hosts now regret and you will be at risk if you rely on these reviews !

This hospitality outsourcing business is becoming a cult for those inside the tent. The endless striving for Superhost status, the needy requests for other hosts to give feedback on their listing, the 1000s of agonizing posts regarding the virtue or necessity of leaving soap v tea bags, to iron sheets or not, to supply shampoo or not, the cogitating about whether soap scum or drain hair, fridge access or feng shui was the real cause of that last poor review... Not to mention the thousands of horror stories and near misses that appear on the site's Group Host Anecdotes.

These wanna be Martha Stewarts have created their own well furnished and tastefully decorated prisons. Hosts are hostage to guest reviews, and are developing coded review strategies to alert each other but not provoke the dreaded negative review, or worse, apparently, no review. The supposed emphasis on security results in a "pant down bend over" protocol for hosts to "verify", but a loose protocol for guests who reportedly game the system.

The site has inaccurate Google tags if you are searching for properties by location, a so called security device: but gives out real addresses to unverified guests whose emails are faked, whose phone numbers are no longer in service, who turn up with extra bodies, and who have trashed, burgled, and robbed hosts.

And a hosting service who thinks it is appropriate to use videos of sleeping women, (no sleeping men mind you) to advertise their site is just out of touch. These videos look real, and show women waking from sleep, apparently unaware they are being filmed. Airbnb say they are actors, but either way, it looks creepy.

The site is hard work, glitchy, under resourced, slow to respond to issues, and lacking support for hosts. Forums do the work of site administrators, and newbies are thrown to the wolves. Guests have the whip hand, and hosts are just collateral damage. You would do as well to do what they used to in the old days, put up a sign: room for rent, apply within.

Airbnb is a wonderful company with great ideas. However, sometimes people can become frustrated especially when dealing with people across various time zones. Travel is a messy business. That being said, most of the problems come from the hosts, and not Airbnb itself. For example, my first experience with the company involved my host canceling just days before my arrival, based on the status on my age (Airbnb standards state you have to be 18+, however she wanted 21+)... Obviously I was frustrated. She had my money and wouldn't let me stay in her home. Airbnb quickly cleared the air, refunded me my money, and gave me 20% off plus an additional $100 for reparations and funds for my next booking. Often times its easy to blame the whole, when really it is simply the disorganization and miscommunication between host and guest. I encourage everyone to use Airbnb and support locals!

Airbnb is a scam, they don't protect the homeowner, they charge fees for taxes that are mandatory. They don't know the laws, and they take fees if the reservation is cancelled in a few minutes. Stay at hotel, or use a vacation property!

We were cancelled by the owner for double booking. I emailed the owner to make sure his place was available and for the price during the holiday before booking online. Almost a month passes after booking then we receive the cancellation. Very unreliable and unprofessional!

DO NOT USE AIRBNB. THEY HAVE NO CONTROL OVER THE OWNERS WHO POST ON THE SITE. In August 2014, I booked a home in Parkland, Florida for 14 members of my family to stay for 4 nights over Thanksgiving weekend. My family was flying in from all over the U,S. This was my first experience with Airbnb. I paid $3392 to Airbnb in August, the full price of the rental of a 7 bedroom, 5 bath home. Last week, I received an e-mail that the owner of the house, Gary, has CANCELLED MY RESERVATION. Airbnb was very sorry. No reason was given for the cancellation. If I had cancelled at anytime, I would have lost 50% of my money. Gary, the owner, was able to walk away. The house is no longer posted on Airbnb, although it is on VRBO.

As a result of the cancellation, Airbnb gave me three links to other homes as possible replacements. Two were in Miami which were geographically undesirable. The third was a "mansion" listed at a price $1,000 per night. When I wrote to the owner to see if the home was available over Thanksgiving, "Richard" said that it was but that the price was now $8,000 for the 4 days. Because someone else showed interest in the house, he was reducing the price to over $6,000 since that was what he had quoted them. ($2,000 more than what was listed). Supervisor, Elena G., offered me money from her "discretionary " account to make up the difference, thus encouraging hosts to gouge their prices.

Airbnb has no control over hosts who can cancel at any time. Additionally, hosts can freely charge what they want regardless of what is posted in the listing, Airbnb allows this to happen. I was not able to find a house for 14 people in time for Thanksgiving. We are all staying at hotels and have not figured out where to have our Thanksgiving dinner at this time. A supervisor at Airbnb did give me a voucher for $500 for my troubles after I asked for some compensation. I was also promised my refund of the $3392 which Airbnb had since early Sept.

I just love this site. I travel now almost exclusively with Airbnb since I rather stay in apartments than in hotels. I also have my own apartment spare room in Airbnb. However this is not for people looking for the safety of a hotel. Using this site, you are going to people's houses. You need to check first your host to see that he/she is reliable and then book. The same applies to hosts. Take a look at the reviews of a person before accepting them to your house. It's common sense. Only negative is their high cost. They charge 15% on top of each reservation for their service. It could be 10%.

In fairness to air b and b, I only have an upcoming stay booked but REALLY dislike their policies and wish that we had never booked through them. I further have an instinct that much of the appeal of this site is to make yourself feel cool and current using it.

In further fairness to the site, I could have personally researched their policies before participating in the transaction described below. I simply (and reasonably) assumed that we merely were booking a place for $X/night and would pay most or all the amount at the end of the stay. I also figured that there might have been some form of cancellation fee, but not that we were gambling roughly $1,000.

My travel (and life) partner booked a vacation a few months ago, and he advocated using air b and b; again to be fair, his experience renting places has been positive. I have not accompanied him on these trips.

The primary issues that I have with this service, which does not seem to even have a customer support email on its website, are that it collects all your money at the time of the reservation, does not allow cancellations for any reason, charges the person making the reservation a 10-percent fee on top of the 5 percent that it charges the homeowner, and does not even pay the homeowner until after the stay is complete. (I do not know if the homeowner gets the money if we do not go.)

I have no cause for complaining that my partner selected a place at the upper end of the price that we were looking to pay. I also accept the clearly stated cleaning fee, which likely will net the owner a nice profit for spending what surely will not be more than one hour of cleaning.

I would have shared concerns had I know that we had to pay the full amount at the time of the booking and that we would be paying a 10-percent fee on top of that. Not only does that make a pricey place a bad bargain, but I do not understand how air b and b can effectively assert regarding the five-percent fee to the owner that the company offers someone who rents a place for $200/night twice as much service as a homeowner who rents a place out for $100/night.

For that matter, the booker paying the 10-percent fee does not get any more service from air b and b for renting the $200 place than the $100 one.

I did express fairly strong concern to my partner on learning of the cancellation fee. I pointed out that we are out all that money in the event that weather, a mechanical problem with the plane, sickness, a family emergency, etc. requires not taking the trip, (Even the not-so-friendly airlines merely charge a large fee if we do not travel and seem to use some discretion regarding imposing that penalty.)

I also noted that we could have stayed in a nice hotel with a location that is as good as our air b and b place, good amenities, daily maid services, and other perks (and would not have required paying anything in advance and would not have charged us if we had cancelled the reservation the day before) for the same total amount that we are paying for the air b and b place.

One suggestion regarding all this is that air b and b do a better job making its policies prominent; these terms should prominently pop up when you enter search terms and should require that you affirmatively click an icon to proceed.

I was promoting the service to friends in the process of researching a place but now am more vocal in warning people against it.

The final bit of fairness to air b and b is that the service may make sense for a family or two couples traveling together who need a full kitchen and/or two or more sleeping areas. It also may make sense for a long-term stay. It definitely does not make sense for a couple or a single person traveling for a week or less.

My issue with airbnb started with being unable to use their service to begin with. I do not send images of my license or my passport to anyone but government officials. The "confirm a few details only you would know" choice let me to a never-ending loop. I replied to their email telling me that my reservation request had not been sent because I was not "verified" and that I could send a video. A video? Of What? To where? They refused to answer any more questions and simply kept sending the same email about my request not being sent. I contacted the host directly, but she did not understand what they wanted either and could not help me. They have my credit card number, my name, my address and my social security card number. How much "verification" can you possibly need??? I feel sorry for hosts and am amazed that anyone goes through all this for a deal. It has been five hours of B.S. I am going to bed.

DO not put your listing on AIRBNB. They delay your payments and its been almost 3 months since the last person checked out of my place and i still have not receive my money.

The customer service sucks and they pretty much use standard templates to answer you

First (and will be the last) experience attempting to book with this service was not good. I see that hosts like the idea that the service is "free", but they make their money on excessive fees and lack of flexibility. Too much for the customer to read before booking, hosts are not allowed to modify anything. We are vacation rental hosts, and use HomeAway/VRBO which has a yearly fee, but charges no percentages or fees for bookings or cancellations, we are in complete control of that, offering our customers the very best service. BUYER BEWARE AND READ THE FINE PRINT BEFORE BOOKING IF YOU HAVE TIME FOR THAT CRAP!

I found a cabin I wanted to rent near Yosemite. When I spoke to the owner for booking, they told be to go to airbnb.com…… That was the beginning of the end. First of all I have never had to give out so much personal information just to book a reservation and I felt very uncomfortable doing so but I wanted the cabin so I pushed forward. When I got to what I thought was the end? Well NOTHING! I got no confirmation that they had my information or that I had a reservation. Just nothing. So I went to FAQ which didn't help at all. I contacted the owner who said they had not received confirmation of payment and to maybe try tech support. I looked for Tech support but guess what? Nothing! I clicked on "Contact" but that took me back to the bottom of the page. To make a long, annoying story short, I kept going around in circles to no avail. I checked what I assumed was my status and it had "Verify me" still there as if I had not just provided my life's history and information so I clicked it again and yup, you guessed it….Nothing. This went on for about 45 or so minuets while I tried to contact someone. I finally gave up and tried to call the owner back but no one answered the phone so I hit the big cancel button and moved on to another cabin that does not use this system. After I was all booked into another cabin with another company I decided to stroll back through the airbnb site. I was concerned about all my personal information floating around without knowing what happened to it. Then I notice in the upper top corner a little telephone icon with the work "Urgent" next to it. I decided to click on it and low and behold, it began to ring. A live person answered the phone. I started telling this person my woes with navigating their site and the man (Very condescendingly) said he was sorry I had problems with their site but he assured me my information was safe. I told him to please delete all the information and delete me from their files. I complained that there was no means in which to solve my problems, no person to talk to, no tech support etc. He asked me if I was using google chrome. I said no, I have a MAC and I use safari. Oh he said, sometimes that is a problem. I said well maybe you should say something at the beginning of your site about only chrome users need apply. He also informed me that the phone icon was for people with "Real emergencies". I also informed him, that their site directly cost his client a four day reservation and that I would not book with any company in the future that uses them. It was obvious he couldn't care less. Bottom line……An annoying site, a waste of time and a lot of personal information given out for no real reason! UGH Horrible to navigate, horrible customer service!

Stay away is right. Although we did book with a host from airbnb, the host forgot to mention that machinery and noise in the surrounding area of the Waikiki townhouse is constant and one is unable to get away from it for a moment. We had the possibility of a hurricane coming our way so were advised to leave three days ahead but our host simply said, "tough luck!"....I would NEVER do that again. Uncomfortably hot during the day as well. No view at all...whereas it was listed as having a view.

DO NOT book with AirBnB. I never do this kind of thing (ranting online about anything) but this NEEDS to be shared so no one else gets $#*!ed over like i did! i used AirBnB for the first time to book a few places in Europe in June (which alone was enough to never want to use them again, a lot of hidden fees etc, and a lot of issues including getting hacked twice, but with no repercussions - luckily...) and then did not use it since. Then about two weeks ago, apparently someone hacked my account and made around 5 reservations bookings to places in London! My credit card was charged over $8,000 (!!!!!!!) of reservations I did not make! Visa said that since i did 'originally' provide my credit card to them (in JUNE, for certain transactions THEN...), it was my fault and would have to be dealt with AirBnB. It was an absolute NIGHTMARE trying to deal with AirBnB, no one could give me a clear answer as to what was going on or the status of my 'reservations' which I obviously immediately wanted to cancel - i was lied to about refunds several times ("oh yes you will be refunded immediately, check your account in a few hours" - HA.) and I had to BEG BEG BEG them daily to refund me (they finally did bit by bit) - absolutely terrible customer service, they are SO eager to hang up on you and clearly don't want to help. Calling them is a big inconvenience for them it appears (and have you noticed how hard it is to find their phone number?? I dare you, try to find it on their site.) The worst is that for the first 4 days (and me calling every day) I had to literally YELL at someone, and then they told me no one had even been assigned to my case yet but that it would be taken care of "soon" and I'd be contacted. I never was, not even once. No email, no call. I had to constantly be calling them and beg THEM to fix their $#*!ing stupid mistakes. Also - did you know that once you enter a credit card, it STAYS in the system? You have NO way of deleting it. I finally demanded my account be shut down immediately. I can't log in now, so I *think* it might be shut down but I keep getting notifications about bookings in London, so clearly they did not fully shut it down. So sketchy, and again, huge lack of respect for members. This site is an absolute $#*!ing joke and a mess, they are completely unsafe and offer no care or support whatsoever to members. ESPECIALLY in an emergency/crisis situation - instead, they choose the old 'ignore and hope everything goes away' philosophy. I strongly, strongly recommend never using this site!!!! If you think it saves you tons of money, straight up it DOES NOT. Just stay in a hotel - you won't have to deal with this bull$#*! unsafe sketchy site, you don't have to talk to or deal with any creeps (or 'hosts' as they like to call them), you don't have to pay random fees that they decide to charge you ("oh, you're not renting a 4 bedroom villa by yourself? We'll have to charge you extra for each guest plus, an extra cleaning fee then!" - Airbnb), just BE SAFE, be comfortable, and me smart - stay in a hotel. Or hostel. At least they try to be legit.

I can't even begin to describe what I think of the entire air bnb concept. It is very unsafe and I would highly advise against booking with them. We had booked through them a couple of times and its never really been that great but it was acceptable and we understood the risks when booking. However, this time it was just not acceptable. We booked early in September our two weeks trip to Tasmania. The last stop would be 4 nights in Hobart over New Years Eve. We booked a lovely cottage and rested in the knowledge that we did well as we booked early on and the trip was all sorted. Late October the Host cancelled our booking for some personal reason. Now we still have't found any alternative accommodation as its all booked out now over the busy period and airbnb has done nothing but apologised and given us our money back. There is no security in this system and I will never ever use this company again!
We have used websites like stayz a lot and this has never happened before.

I am zero for two on Airbnb. The host for the first place in New York didn't realize the date and time I was to arrive didn't answer his phone and showed up two hours late (around midnight) after I had booked a hotel room thinking he wasn't going to show up at all. Then, the toilet didn't work for the week and he never came around to fix it. The second place in Jerusalem was very run down and dirty. Both locations had fairly good reviews which I will never understand. I will never use Airbnb again!!

This site is very strict with both parties ensuring a confident booking of Bed & Breakfasts. Everyone must communicate through the site and it has a pay structure that protects the buyer and the seller.

As always, pay close attention to reviews of individual renters. Having avoided badly reviewed B&Bs, I have had nothing but good experiences.

AIRBnB DOESNT SERVICE THEIR RENTALS WELL

In September 2014, we rented a condo from Airbnb for 6 nights. . It was represented to us as a luxury condo with a view of ........ The price was $2,500

Here is a list of the problems we encountered during our brief stay.

1. The toilet in the guest bathroom was running constantly. It never stopped the whole time we were there. On the second day, the toilet bowl would not refill unless I took the top off and moved a few parts around. Had to be done every time the toiled was flushed. Maintenance came up and got it to refill but not stop running about every 45 seconds. They said the whole inside needing replacing. This never happened and toilet was running when we left. The whole 6 days!!

2. The light over the vanity in the same bathroom was out. This was fixed 2 days later.

3. A table light in the living room had a short in it. I didn't fix it but got it to work.

4. On day 4, we went to use the Washer only to find it full of dirty, stinky water that would not drain out. When we entered the condo on the first day, we found 3 bags of dirty laundry on the floor of utility room. It was removed and we didn't pay any more attention to it. After we tried to use the Washer and found it full of the stale water, we figured out why the dirty laundry was on the floor. Someone knew the Washer was broken when we moved in but did nothing about it. We were told it would be fixed but along with everything else, it was not. We were able to use the small washer in a unit 9 floors up and at the other end of the hall from ours. Had to make 4/5 trips to complete the wash.

5. Last but not least, The view out the bedroom window was of the roof level of the parking garage and the view out of the living room area was a continuation of the parking garage roof full of cigarette butts and garbage. Looked like it had not been cleaned in years.

I sent this to Airbnb, but needless to say, I never heard a word from them

If you want to protect your identity DO NOT book with Airbnb. Their policy (that airbnb does not have the courtesy to disclose upfront but only when you pay after spending hours researching your vacation accommodation options) of requiring offline AND online identification is crazy. For offline verification, US clients must give last 4 of SSN and birth date or passport or drivers license uploaded to airbnb's site PLUS they also want online verification - a link to your twitter, linkedin or facebook!! And if you can't supply that then a uploaded video of yourself to airbnb's site! I do not give this info to the IRS or my bank AND they do not request it either. Airbnb certainly is not my personal friend and they now have access to nearly ALL my life both financial and social! In this day and age of ID theft, crazy! Bye-bye Airbnb. I'll be back if you revise your new policy.

The first time I used AirBnB it was fine - we arranged a room at short notice and it all went smoothly. Since then I've tried multiple times and I've always been rejected by the hosts - despite having a positive rating. Hosts don't usually even provide a reason. I was hoping to use AirBnB instead of a hotel or hostel but that really doesn't work if it's unreliable.

*****DO NOT USE AIRBNB@@@ Here are reasons why;

1. Airbnb does not do proper precreening or check up on condition of the rooms/places as they leave it to their "hosts" to provide rooms for their guests in whatever the condition hosts feel is proper. I once checked into a room where kitchen was filled with crawling maggots! My wife and I had to clean up the place we paid to stay for 4 days as Airbnb failed to help! She basically paid her money to Airbnb to clean the kitchen and rest of the stanger's apartment during her vacation!

2. Airbnb Customer Service Reps are almost nonexistent. You can hardly EVER get anyone on the phone. If you somehow ever do, person on the phone sounds terribly undertrained. No help at all other than keep aplogizing for their failures.

3. Airbnb will secure your payment FIRST then try to resolve any problems whilst holding your funds hostage. For example, if you ever try booking and transaction does not go through, it will still hold your money more than a month on a canceled reservation. You have to call and email them more than two, three dozen times, begging them, to give you your own money back. They admited they have some flaws in their payment system, but these flaws only come in play when it comes to refunds, not when it comes to taking your money.

4. Horrific verification process- even AFTER you log on to your own accout, have your reservation accepted and have your bookings FULLY PAID FOR, Airbnb will STILL demand you to enter your personal information such as last four digits of your SSN, date of birth, address and oh yeah, SCANNED COPIES OF TWO GOVERNMENT ISSUED IDs online. If you don't upload your IDs onto their website, they will LOCK YOU OUT from seeing any of your existing reservations, even ones you AREADY PAID FOR IN FULL. Sure, they "promise" their website is very secure, but don't they all say such until there is a major breach and hacked into? Can you REALLY trust them with ALL your personal information such as following?
1. Last 4 digits of your SSN
2. Date of Birth
3. Address
4. 2 forms of Government Issued IDs

Am I buying a house? I am just merely trying to rent a place to stay! I don't know any other travel website that demands so much of your personal information that should be protected at all costs, do you?

So, ask yourselves...whether you are taking your time off to spend quality time with your love ones on your vacation or in a business trips, is this kind of service or shall I say no service you want to deal with while being away from home?

Tried to book a room in San Francisco. Reservation was never processed by Airbnb, however my $1000 payment was ABSOLUTELY processed.

It was VERY difficult to reach a human being to try to resolve the problem. When I did--finally--they were no help whatsoever (even spoke to a supervisor--no joy).

In short, I DO NOT recommend you do business with Airbnb. If your experience is anything like mine, you will absolutely regret it if you do.

Booked accommodation through airbnb. airbnb client took my money, no accommodation provided. Airbnb refused to take responsibility and refused to refund me. EBAY and Amazon would assume responsibility and protect the integrity of their markets. Not Airbnb. Their market has no integrity and is doomed. BEWARE! DO NOT USE AIRBNB!

Stay away.
The hosts reply to your reservation requests in their own good time.
The host can cancel your accommodation with 24 hrs notice; can you imagine what situation this puts you in when you have flights booked for a family.
If you you are not happy with your accommodation you can't leave bad feedback on the airbnb site.
DON'T TAKE THE RISK.
Its all one sided towards the host and you can be stranded in an unfamiliar city with no accommodation.

I have been using airbnb for quite some time and I like the concept.
airbnb is however a very interesting company. While they contact me endlessly, there is no way to contact them.
It is a company that for all practical purposes provides NO support.

I wish they stopped bothering me re reviews. I'll write them when they start to provide support.

AirBnB sucks! Just a warning to all of you who are thrilled about AirBnB like I was. I wait for 700 EUR for a cancelled booking since over a month. No response from AirBnB customer service. And I have to pay 10 % (i.e. 80 EUR) service fee to AirBnB (my host sees nothing of this money) despite cancelling 1 month in advance.

Last summer Airbnb was great. All my guests were cool and we got along well. In the off season however things changed. I had a guest who initally appeared okay but turned into a drunk the loud, opinionated and gross kind. I had to ask him to go to a hotel. I did not report him at the time because he did not demand a refund. I had already booked another male guest who was emailing me with inappropriate requests and gave me the impression he thought this was a dating site. I cancelled five days before he arrived because of my previous bad experience. The guest phoned me begging to be allowed to stay with me. It was desperadoville. I did not pay any attention to the postings saying that I had cancelled the booking. I also cancelled a booking a few months in advance because I could not promise the guest the room would still be available then. Another person booked in and after she arrived I discovered that I had been charged 150 in fees for the two cancellations. I tried to contact Airbnb a couple of times with no reply. I tried again and got a reply from someone called Lily who was very polite and continued to send me information from the site, but ignored my request for a refund. I pointed out the various inconsistencies in their own policies and never got a response to those. Finally Lily told me that my complaint has been resolved which it hasnt and so I have pulled the plug on Airbnb.

Don't go there. In June, I booked a flat in Williamsburg, Brooklyn for the dates of August 15 to 17. At the time of booking, I went through the full online registration process and then pre paid for the stay by credit card, also providing my address and phone number. Over the next 60 days or so, I received several emails from both AirBnb and the host, reminding me of my reservation and asking for my arrival time. I thought AirBnb was switched on.

Then, less than 24 hours prior to my scheduled 4:00 PM check in time on August 15, I got an email from the "Trust and Security" division at Air, requiring me to send them a copy of my photo ID via email. Failing this option, my reservation would be cancelled. Obviously, I wouldn't email a copy of my passport to the Pope. I suggested to Air that I present my passport on arrival. No go. I was forced to make a last minute, very pricy booking at a Brooklyn hotel.

AirBnb created a needless last minute travel hassle. They also cost me $500.00. Never again.

Terrible. I had a booking from a guest who told me after she booked that she would be arriving at 1.00am. I told her that nobody would be available to check her in at that time. She refused to cancel so I had to cancel the reservation. AIRBNB fined me 100 dollars. I wrote to them to ask why but never received a reply. Awful, awful company.

Read the fine print. Depending on the state you live, the guest may become a tenant if s/he reserves for 30+ days. If you have a problem, Airbnb customer service is almost nonexistent. When tenant refused to leave, I called the "urgent" number, 2 times and waited over 40 minutes with no response.

Advise do not rent to locals, at least you have a decent chance of the person leaving if they are from out of town. My local yokel is the tenant from hell and Airbnb is NO HELP!!!!!

You'll have a problem with Airbnb if you have a problem with a location. We stayed at a flat with a plumbing issue, so we had to quickly move locations, as we had been without the use of a toilet from the night before. We went to the Airbnb website, where there was no telephone number to be found. We scrambled to find a hotel to stay in and then made a claim online at Airbnb. Once we returned home and received a call from Airbnb, we were told that, if we had called Airbnb BEFORE going to the hote,l they would have covered the cost of the hotel. BUT OF COURSE THEY GAVE NO PHONE NUMBER ON THEIR WEBSITE TO DO THAT! Wasn't that convenient. The only way we were able to get in direct contact was to hit cancel on the reservation and then a week later (after we were home) THEY CALLED US!

I used Airbnb for my trip back in May and I stayed at over 5 listings across Europe, namely London, Paris, Nice (2 listing), and Amsterdam. Reading the reviews somehow made me feel wary although I had a wonderful time at all of these listings. It was understandable at some of the listings the internet are a bit off and a few dusty cupboard. But all in all it was not bad at all despite it being my first experience.

I was declined for a lot of listings too and despite some of them personally replying me saying that the dates are not available which is nice but I would still get it too if they just decline because every query requires one to provide number of guests and date of check in and check out. Them sending us an automated declined would suggest that our dates/number of guests did not match their listing.

As far as being first time users and not being reviewed thus the rejection, I feel that it is important that you create your profile with complete profile of yourself such as your intended trip purposes and a photo. (as much as we are afraid to trust the other person they are also afraid and have to thread very carefully even more so as they are allowing us into their homes)

I was never a host but at all the 5 listings I took time to ask the hosts their experience as hosts and they positively described their experience as host and 1 of the host was even a Super Host on Airbnb.

As I am sure with all other Bnb's or accommodation everyone is worried they might be scammed and we are clueless to know whether or not a particular contact could be a scam thus I suggest taking extra precautions for all payment transactions and personal infos released. Airbnb is definitely and interesting concept to me as they allow me personal contact with locals and give me better insights to their own city.

My reasons to sought out reviews and found this was due to another trip I am planning to take and realized that anything could happen to anyone.

Just my thoughts.

Airbnb has done a really slick PR campaign in the UK recently, making the concept of the “sharing economy” sound so great and noble. And to be fair I do know a couple of people who have made successful bookings with them. But from my own first experience I would only recommend using this site whilst exercising EXTREME CAUTION and a healthy dose of SCEPTICISM. Don’t get swept up in the trendy PR message of “we’re all one big, happy, caring-sharing family looking to break the monopoly of the evil hotel chains”. The company is currently valued at 10 billion dollars, it’s a monster money-making machine in its own right and seems to have less integrity and accountability than many of the large hotel/letting giants.

I haven't actually made a booking with them yet (and probably never will) but my user experience on the site was pretty dire. We were looking for an apartment in Palma de Mallorca for a few days ... I hope this rather long review will give potential users an overview of why Airbnb may not be as good as it seems on paper.....

The very first property we considered clearly had incorrect information on the listing - ie, the title stated, and pictures showed, that it was a large 5 bed villa in what looked like an out-of-town location, BUT the 'blurb' underneath then went on to say that it was a small apartment with only 2 bedrooms and was in the centre of town. I clicked on the 'Contact host' button rather than the 'Request to book' button, since I wasn't requesting to book, I simply wanted to clarify the issue and give the host the benefit of the doubt that it was a one-off mistake. However, in my private Airbnb messages, I just got an automated reply saying ‘Declined’. How can a booking be “declined” when it was never requested in the first place?? If they meant that my request for information was “declined” that’s kinda even worse. It left a sour taste, ie, no personal response from the host explaining why their listing was wrong which it very, very clearly was…

A second property we were interested in looked like a large villa in a beachside location …. The response to the enquiry via the Airbnb message system requested us to contact the supposed host’s “wife” via another email address (cunningly disguised to look like an offical Airbnb email) … this is a scam…. DO NOT contact anyone from Airbnb if they suggest you communicate with them directly outside of the site. I got an automated email from Airbnb about 24 hrs later saying that they had detected a potential fraud and not to contact the host again. Which is good on the one hand that they spotted this (although I noticed 3 days later the fraudulent listing was STILL up on the site) but bad in that in only our second enquiry we had come up against a scam on their website, a property that clearly didn’t exist for rent (Looking back, I think the scammers had just cut-and-pasted some photos from another website).

The one saving grace was an interaction with a host on our third enquiry who seemed genuine and was very polite and responsive and lovely. Thank you Richard of “Huge Old Town Modernist Apartment” listing, you were fabulous (and the only reason I've given 2 stars rather than 1 star overall).

However, the next couple of listings we looked at – showing on the Airbnb map as being separate properties, a mile apart, and listed at different prices - BOTH HAD EXACTLY THE SAME PICTURES!! I didn’t bother contacting the hosts as I was fed up and disillusioned by this point.

The upshot of all this is that, honestly, you cannot completely trust the listings.

And don’t necessarily be lulled into a sense of security if the property you book has great reviews. I'm sure many, many reviews are genuine, but out of curiosity after our poor experience, I briefly trawled through 60 property listings in a search of “Palma de Mallorca” – don’t you think it’s a little suspicious that I only found ONE review out of more than 130 individual user reviews for different properties that was less than 4.5 stars out of 5? Compare to TripAdvisor, which isn’t perfect either, but at least they seem to actually allow people to post negative reviews and the customer can then take it all with a pinch of salt, read between the lines and get an overall balanced view. I cannot believe that all 60 of those Airbnb properties in Palma are SO marvellous that noone had posted a less-than-glowing review. Are they somehow blocking negative reviews from the site to make it look good? I would not be at all surprised.

Just take huge care when using Airbnb is all I’m saying, there are clearly lots of genuine hosts and happy customers, but the increasing popularity of the site has inevitably opened it up to large numbers of commercial agents looking to flog their inventory (rather than individual property owners trying to make a bit of extra cash from their beloved home, which is how Airbnb markets itself) as well as outright scammers and charlatans. Certainly the majority of listings we looked at in Palma were handled by agents, not owners, as evidenced by their multiple listings. Which makes it no different to booking with any other villa/property rental website.

It sounds like this company has become a willing victim of its own success – what started out as a great idea has been overtaken by financial greed and an inability to keep pace with the dramatic growth in terms of security and customer service. It sounds like it’s become a numbers game for them – “OK, so xx percent of our customers/hosts are really dissatisfied, but there’s always a bunch of others to take their place, so we don’t need to worry too much about keeping the complainers happy!”

Be aware that Airbnb does not vet the properties offered, or ask for any proof of ownership such as a utility bill or whatever, they take the host’s descriptions/photos at face value. And pretty much anyone can register as a host, despite all the guff about ‘verification’ etc. Also be aware that your booking is not guaranteed – the host has the ability to cancel at very short notice, leaving you stranded. Plus if you have a problem, the small print on the Airbnb website (which I studied in detail) pretty much guarantees that you will have no comeback. Once you pay for your booking, they can effectively wash their hands of it and claim that it was up to you to check things out before you parted with your money.

You may get lucky and have a lovely time with Airbnb, but PLEASE at least consider the potential pitfalls, of which there are many, and go into it with your eyes very wide open.

I tried to book accommodation in Glasgow and spent many hours retyping the two credit cards to use. The BOOK NOW button remained inactive, so I contacted the hosts to tell of the situation. They were communicative and did their best to help.

I contacted airbnb who replied "Hello William,

I'm sorry you've been having trouble with the site. If you have been viewing airbnb on a different browser, be advised that is best to view Airbnb in Google Chrome.

If you’d like, we have a help article on the topic: https://www.airbnb.com/help/question/446

In many cases, issues like this can be also easily solved by clearing your internet browser's history, cookies, and cache.

I see you just joined, welcome to Airbnb! I hope it brings you wonderful experiences. As a token of our welcome i would like to offer you a $100USD coupon for your first trip:

Code: LCSOQSVT
Expires: 2015-08-05

Let me know if I can be if any further assistance.

Happy Travels William!
Evie"

To try regain the booking I asked my daughter-in-law to make the booking for me.

With her iphone and previous airbnb app she couldn't even log in, so she had to delete the app and reinstall the latest edition before she was allowed in, The booking had been taken.

This shows that whoever writes their web software is only interested in the 18 to 20 year olds with the latest technology. The software engineer's manager should be informed of his narrow window of conception and operation.

Most websites manage to accommodate ALL operating systems without marginalising old fashion software platforms, or else their market would shrink.

I'm going to pronounce this failure of operation on various forums, as I'd hate anyone to experience what I've been through, my first and only time.

Yours unfaithfully,
William.

P.S. I successfully booked in to an hotel. It might be 29GBP more but a straight forward transaction is simple and without headache.