What To Do If Your Airbnb Host Cancels Your Accommodation At The Last Minute?

Have you ever had your Airbnb accommodation canceled at the last minute by your host? Don’t you hate that? You have already paid the full amount of your reservation and thought you were on your way. Moreover, you are left with a few hours to make changes to your plans.

Well, the night before our check-in for one of our recent trips, we were notified by our Airbnb host that he missed to check his calendar and his unit was actually fully booked so he cannot accommodate us. 

We messaged the host right away to clarify and get more information. He apologized that he failed to confirm availability from his end before accepting the reservation. Note that there was no offer of help from him in finding an alternative accommodation. When we asked what we need to do next, he advised us to cancel the reservation. However, when we checked in Airbnb's website, they discourage guests from canceling reservations for the host as it would mean the guest cannot get any refund.

So what to do if your host cancels your accommodation? Airbnb offers two options: transfer your payment to a new Airbnb reservation or get a full refund. 

But these two options are only available when your host cancels the reservation within the cancellation window. In our case, since we were notified less than 24 hours before our arrival, neither the host nor us can cancel the reservation. We told our host that he needs to find a way to cancel the reservation as we cannot cancel it and at the same time we wanted to avoid being penalized if we were the one to do it. He told us that he is unable to cancel as it was already close to the arrival. He then offered to personally refund the entire amount of the reservation by doing a wire transfer of the money to my bank account. Though Airbnb recommends processing monetary transactions and communications through its secure platform. Airbnb protects the money of its guests by not releasing payments to the hosts until 24 hours after check-in. This gives guests an alternative should problems arise with the reservation.

To avoid further complications, we went through the website's Help Center to find a way to cancel the reservation and request for a refund. Yet, this self-service tool was not useful as it only contains common questions and scenarios. Our concern did not fit nicely into what were provided in the Help Center. 

Since the Help Center was not so helpful, we were getting frustrated and we felt the urgent need to get in contact with an Airbnb Representative to handle the cancellation and refund of the reservation. However, finding the phone numbers to call directly Airbnb was difficult. The numbers are well hidden it's like searching for treasures inside the website. If you also need to contact Airbnb to resolve your issues, you can just check the list below of all the local Airbnb phone numbers.

Country	Phone Number
United States	+1-415-800-5959 or +1-855-424-7262 (toll-free)
Argentina	+54 11 53 52 7888
Australia	+61 2 8520 3333
Austria	+43 72 08 83 800
Brazil	+55 21 3958-5800
Canada	+1-855-424-7262 (toll-free)
Chile	+56 229380777
China	+86 10 5904 5310 or 400 890 0309 (shared-cost)
Denmark	+45 89 88 20 00
France	+33 1 84 88 4000
Germany	+49 30 30 80 8380
Greece	+30 211 1989888
Hong Kong	+852 5808 8888
Ireland	+353 1 697 1831
Israel	+972 3 939 9977
Italy	+39 06 99366533
Japan	+81 3 4580 0999 or +81 800 100 1008 (toll-free)
Mexico	+52 55 41 70 4333
Netherlands	+31 20 52 22 333
New Zealand	+64 4 4880 888
Norway	+47 21 61 16 88
Peru	+51 1 7089777
Poland	+48 22 30 72 000
Portugal	+351 30 880 3888
Puerto Rico	+1 787 919-0880
Russia	+7 4954658090 or 8 800 301 7104 (toll-free)
Singapore	+65 6622 7306  or +65 800 723 1238 (toll-free)
South Korea	+82 2 6022 2499 or +82 808 220 230 (toll-free)
Spain	+34 91 123 45 67
Sweden	+46 844 68 12 34
Switzerland	+41 43 50 84 900
United Kingdom	+44 203 318 1111

We contacted the Singapore number as there was no local number in the Philippines. We talked to a helpful representative named Gabrielle who asked us to explain what happened. After hearing our situation, she then confirmed that the reservation can no longer be cancelled by the host. She offered to cancel it from her end and request for a full refund of the payment. She also sent an email to make sure we have a reference in writing regarding our conversation. Lastly, she surprised us with a US$50 coupon welcome gift that we can use for any future reservation.

Hopefully this entry will make it easier to contact Airbnb regarding last minute cancellations. Let us know if there are numbers that are not working and we'll try to update it right away.