So you booked AirBnB place and then...
 

Here is the situation. I booked AibBnB place more than 2 month ago, and one of the main criteria was quietness. I am light sleeper and my wife ever more - she sleeps with earplugs and even it does not help.

Today, two days before arrival, I got a message - 'sorry but there is a couple with 10 month old baby, staying at my house too, but baby is quiet'.

Well, I told her that this is deal breaker and asked her to cancel the reservation. If I cancel on my side, I would lose everything because reservation is already past refund date. I got following reply 'you will need to cancel at your end as i did try my end and was told you have to cancel at your end'.

My question to the audience - what to do and how to get my already paid money back? Am I right that if I cancel than AirBnB will point out that due to this I am not entitled to any refund? Do I need to file a dispute? Do I need to call to credit card company and initiate chargeback?

If any of you have been in the similar situation with AiBnB as a guest - how did you resolve it?

Thanks, timely replies on this specific topic is appriciated

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Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator

Definitely dirty pool. I suspect if the owner cancels, he has to pay a fee anyway and he doesn't want to lose the money.

I'd get in contact with AirBnB and send them the communication chain that shows you insisted on quiet, and now the owner is trying to weasel out of it.

Good luck!

I'm not sure that the fact that you don't like the idea of some of the other guests at the B and B is sufficient to allow you to break your contract.

This is from the property description:


So if she put 'no children' sign for the room we rented, where from suddenly now 10 month baby appeared?

That does change things. The question for you to consider then is does that part of the description form a condition of contract which would give rights of repudiation, or is it a mere warranty? In normal circumstances I'd say the latter (because for most people, I think the presence or otherwise of children in the building is largely incidental to contract performance - being the provision of a bedroom, bed, certain degree of comfort, etc.), but if you specifically told her at time of booking that you were booking on the basis of no children under 12 being there, then you would have a condition of contract I'd say.

As an ex-AirBnB host I think the obligation is on the host not to accept subsequent potentially noisy guests. That is providing you made it clear that quietness was a condition of your booking and the host confirmed agreement in writing

The message sent to invisible strongly suggests ("sorry...but...") that the host knew the baby's presence could be a problem.

Update on this. I asked to the host couple of clarification questions and got following answer:

"To be honest a good baby can developed teething problems stomach ach any time I wasn't a where the baby was travelling with them . their room is at the top of the hallway on the right side your is the first room on the left. I myself wouldn't take the risk that there wouldn't be any noise. I am sorry this is the second time children haven't been mentioned .I picked up a couple from the Airport and they had a 3 year I wander if the read my profile."

So, if I trust her words - she did not know. Seems that a couple booked other room and did not mention that they are traveling with baby and let hosts and other people deal with it post factum.

The host needs to be much more proactive about children. An email and or phone call confirming a very firm "no children" policy would avoid the problem. There are always people who don't read, don't think the rules apply to them or don't think their baby in arms counts as a child.

Final update. We decided to proceed and stay at the arranged place and it was right decision. While baby cried couple of times, the couple had a room farther away and it did not bother us much.

As for the host lady - she could not be any nicer. She did apologize for the situation, but what can you do when people just show off with baby on their arms? She asked them if they read the requirement for the property and their reply was 'it is a baby, not a child' (SIC!).

Ha, like when they say their adult child and they are only 16 and the ad says no one under 21. That happened to one of my hosts and the person was to stay alone too EEK!!

Wow... that is some stunning arrogance by those travelers. Thanks for the follow-up and glad that it worked out. Sounds like the host is stand-up, but has gotten taken advantage by some arrogant guests on a few occasions.

Regards

Glad the situation worked out for you, invisible.

When researching AirBnB before my first stay, saw on the host forums that they deal with this sort of stuff not infrequently, so not too surprised about that unscrupulous couple gaming the system.

I agree with gobluetwo that people do try to weasel around house rules. It's difficult as a host to successfully resolve these situations. If I had been hosting in the same situation, I would have called Airbnb support immediately (there is a number to call, but Airbnb makes it very difficult to find, so many hosts don't know it exists).

I have two rooms for rent in my home and had a situation once where one room was booked, and then I got a request for the other one from people who wanted to bring their dog. I said I'd have to check with the previously booked guests to see what their reaction would be; as a result of that I declined the dog people's booking.

Regarding the cancellation from the host's end, it is definitely possible, but it is detrimental to one's "score" in the way properties are listed, and it also makes hosts ineligible for Superhost status. (Even one cancellation by a host means you're out as a Superhost.) So I'm not surprised that the host didn't want to do that. It all could have been worked out (with no penalty to either guest or host) via Airbnb support, though. They are pretty good about such things, in my experience.