Is AirBnb Headed Down the Same Scandalous Path as Lyft?

Up to this point, I’ve posted about the fairy tale adventures @michelios and @martiawilson and I have had traveling through the south of France. The trip was near perfect, but we did have an incident with our last AirBnb that bears documenting on the blockchain. It’s the worst experience I’ve ever had with an AirBnb host or when traveling, period.

I’m not sure what the correct course of action is at this point. AirBnb disallows reviews by anyone other than the account holder who booked the stay, and in this case, that wasn’t me, although I am quite responsible for choosing this location based on its description. Sadly, that description turned out to be misleading on a very fundamental level.

I also learned that AirBnb does not accept complaints from anyone except the account holder. This shares an eerie resonance with the recent Lyft scandal where complaints from women were ignored or dismissed even when they involved assault. If a woman other than an account holder suffers abuse at the hands of an AirBnb host, it does not seem possible for her to submit a complaint to AirBnb directly. Sure, she could and should file charges with the police. But what if such abuse was more subtle, not so much an overt crime as a case of harrassment, discrimination, or bigotry? I believe I have a case for all three after my stay at the following location last month.

One might argue that it started with a misunderstanding. That’s a very diplomatic way of seeing this, because I maintain it started with a very deliberate misrepresentation on the AirBnb site itself. In Philippe’s description of “Natur Pur im Burgund” at the time of booking, the “house rules” read this way: “No smoking Check-in time is flexible and check out by 12PM (noon)-a partir de minuit plutot silencieux- Wir erwünschen uns von unseren Gästen einen respektvollen Umgang mit Haus und Umwelt- ab Mitternacht ist ein ruhiges Verhalten selbstverständlich.” A statement in the description read as follows: “The house is well suited for couples, solo travelers adventurers, families (with children) and furry friends (pets).”

Interesting that the first thing Philippe did upon our entrance into the home was shut the door in the faces of our 25-pound assistance dogs and leave them outside in a strange location, in the dark. If one of our group members hadn’t stayed out with them, they would have panicked and who knows what could have happened to them.

It is critical that potential guests know that there are “rules” about staying here that do not appear either in the description on AirBnb’s site or in the “house rules” section. The most critical is that dogs are unwelcome in all but one area of the accomodation, and that is downstairs on the stone floor. They are strictly forbidden from going upstairs with their owner and specifically from sleeping with their owners in the beds or on the furniture. This is fine in itself, as each property owner can set their own rules for stay. However...and this is a BIG however...these restrictions should be clearly listed in the “house rules” section of the AirBnb site so that potential guests can decide if this is a condition they can abide with.

One of the dogs traveling with us is a trained assistance dog who performs specific tasks. Separation from her handler is not possible. Not that it’s anyone’s business, but I have primary lupus and rheumatoid arthritis with secondary dysautonmia and ataxia, and due to the symptoms of these conditions, I have medical certification to travel with not one but two service animals who perform different tasks.

After learning that Philippe required animals to be contained to the downstairs common area, I told him that I would sleep there on the sofa with the dogs on the floor beside me. Yet Philippe continued to insist that I would sleep upstairs in the bed and then launched into a bitter diatribe about me not “following his rules.” Despite the fact that a solution to the problem of miscommunicated expectations was resolved immediately by me agreeing to sleep downstairs on the sofa, I was assured that taking a dog into one’s bed to sleep was “abnormal” and he had never heard of such a thing.

I then tried to explain that service animals have public access rights and in the U.S., where I’m from, lawsuits can result when proprietors discriminate on the basis of a disability that requires use of a service animal. Philippe dismissed this information with a wave of his hand, stating that this is his property and he can make whatever rules he wishes, and then went on to assure me that I was “not in America anymore.”

Certainly it is true that property owners can set whatever rules they wish. However, to represent an accomodation as welcoming of pets and then force owners to be separated from their animals--particularly assistance animals--is bad business. Furthermore, as a retired animal welfare professional who spent many years working side by side with animal control officers and other animal welfare agencies, I was very concerned to see what looked like two Burmese Mountain Dogs (it was dark so I couldn’t see them well, but they were very large dogs) confined in a tiny pen not appropriate for one animal that size, much less two. There are also exotic birds housed in aviaries on the property and I can only hope that the care they receive is sufficient for their highly specialized needs.

After Philippe continued to berate me about not being willing to follow his rules--despite the fact that I, with increasingly emphatic tone, tried to explain that I would sleep on the sofa and not upstairs where the dogs are forbidden, I suggested that Philippe amend his AirBnb description to include more accurate information in the house rules. He stated that he could not do this. I told him that was fine, because I would provide this information for him in the review I’d leave about his listing. And that’s when things went completely off the rails.

I’ve stayed in Airbnbs I didn’t like, and I’ve encountered hosts who didn’t respond to messages and hosts who were borderline rude. But I’ve never been blatantly insulted by a host...until Philippe. Once he knew I intended to leave a review that included these details, he proceeded to tell me that I would certainly lie in doing so, because I’m a liar and he “knows my kind.”

Yes. He said this. To me, directly, without a flicker of recognition about the line he had just crossed. This is verbal abuse, plain and simple. When I combined this with his declaration that people who sleep with their animals in their beds are “abnormal,” the only conclusion I could draw is that certain issues were at play here that far overshadowed a simple aversion to animals on his furniture.

To make matters worse, I noticed at that point that Philippe seemed quite happy to continue discussion with the lone male in our group, as if conflict resolution with a woman was beneath him. When Michel continued trying to explain that we had not once asked that he allow the dogs upstairs but that I would stay downstairs with them, Philippe said that we should find a hotel because his accomodation was no longer available. Michel, being the diplomat he is, managed to turn the conversation around so that we didn’t have to leave in the middle of the night and find a hotel room, and suddenly upon hearing from a man that I would sleep on the sofa downstairs, Philippe agreed to this compromise and asked why we hadn’t said we’d do that before.

This was not a matter of language barrier. Philippe speaks flawless English. And I don’t stutter. At one point I had physically put my hands on one of the downstairs sofas and said, “Here. I am sleeping here. Neither the dogs nor I will go upstairs.” Only when hearing it--still in English--from a man, did Philippe agree to our proposal.

Portions of our encounter with Philippe were recorded as proof that we are not fabricating this story. That recording will not be released or made public unless we are required by AirBnb to verify our claims. We also have extensive video taken on the day of our departure of the property’s interior to show that neither we nor our dogs damaged it in any way.

Why am I posting this here on the Steem blockchain? Because at its core, the blockchain is an indelible ledger where secure transactions are possible, therefore this is the best place to store such documentation.

Do I recommend this property for potential guests? No. I cannot. It is most definitely not appropriate for people traveling with pets. It is, however, a beautiful piece of land and the house itself is quite nice. For people traveling without dogs, it may be worth the risk of a nasty encounter with Philippe to stay here. I would, however, suggest keeping the women in your group silent and let a man handle the booking.