Be very careful about using a discount code when booking with Airbnb. If you cancel, they will steal the amount of the discount from you.
I booked a room with Airbnb using a discount coupon - I think it was PAYPAL40.
The total cost for the room was $563, which is $502 plus an Airbnb service fee of $61, which is non-refundable. The Airbnb discount coupon was $42, which took my total cost down to $521.
A few weeks later, I had to cancel the booking. The host agreed to a full refund, and yet the amount I was refunded was only $418, which left me $103 out of pocket.
I contacted Airbnb, and tried to explain that they had made a mistake. They tried to explain that I paid $521 and that the Airbnb service fee of $61 was non-refundable which takes the cost down to $460. Then they said that the voucher was voided so that they reduced this by a further $42, which leaves me with $418 as a full refund.
I did see the following on the Airbnb website after receiving the full refund from the host:
“The coupon of $42 AUD you used for this reservation is non-refundable”
I told them that I understood that the discount coupon was non-refundable but that I didn’t expect to actually have the pay this amount to them if I cancel. I said that the refund should be based on the net cost of the room, which is $502, and when the $42 voucher is taken off this, the refund should be $460.
I tried a few other ways to explain this:
1. I tried to explain that the $42 coupon should be taken off the gross amount when calculating the refund, not the net amount (it is already taken off the gross amount to get to the net amount).
2. I added the amounts and showed that
$418 + $61 + $42 + $42 = $563.
This was to show them that you had to add the $42 twice to the refunds and service fee to get the full cost.
3. I said that if I had not used a coupon I’d have paid $563 in total and would have received a refund of $501. Yet now because I got a $42 discount, my refund is $84 less, which is not right.
4. I explained that I paid Airbnb $521 originally and now they’re refunding me $418, leaving me $103 out of pocket, even though the only non-refundable amount was the $61 service fee. They tried to explain that this was a sum total of the $61 fee plus the $42 voucher. But they didn’t seem to understand that I never received $42 so they can’t take it away – it was a discount.
I also made the point that when I made the booking and used the discount code, I didn’t see any warning that said that if I cancel, that I would then be charged the amount of the discount. They didn’t understand this.
They did offer to restore my voucher so that I could use it again, but I made it clear that I don’t want to pay $42 to get a $42 discount coupon and I just wanted my money back.
It looks like Airbnb refund process doesn’t work when the customer has used a coupon. I don’t think that they are trying to steal from me, as they really didn’t seem to understand what they were doing wrong.
It was an unfuriating conversation that took about an hour, as they didn't seem to understand the basic maths. I'm going to consumer affairs but not really sure if that will help. Airbnb is a multi-national company so it may be hard for a Victorian consumer body to force them to act. But I'll also try to get Paypal to help if necessary. Seems like a lot of effort for $42 but they have probably done this to many other customers and it has to be stopped.
TL;DR when cancelling a booking with AirBNB, they won't refund the value of any vouchers used, meaning you'll be out of pocket by their 'service fee', plus the value of the voucher