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| Hospitality Today | Christmas 2016 / January 2017
Airbnb‘ not responsible’
Hotels and B & Bs who comply with regulations and pay taxes complain that it is a huge disadvantage to them to be undercut by those who fail to do either – and to be allowed to do so by complacent policymakers and sleepy regulators.
The BHA and B & B Association protest the unfairness of their members being held to comply with some 140 rules, regulations and requirements whilst their newest commercial competitors on‘ peer-to-peer platforms’ like Airbnb go unchecked and( in effect) unregulated. No wonder, they say, Airbnb grew by a further 73 % last year. Though the rules do apply to them too, they are not enforced by regulators.
To add insult to injury, ministers have greeted the‘ disruptors’ with an enthusiastic and seemingly unqualified welcome.
Meanwhile consumers are surprised to find they are unprotected – as were Jess Paterson and her friends, who were badly injured in an Airbnb rental in Brighton when the balcony collapsed, with three of the four injured falling two storeys to basement level.
The fourth fell to street level and was impaled through the torso, narrowly missing his vital organs. All four required emergency surgery. Since the accident one of the victims has been unable to work, and two of them had to cancel their wedding and honeymoon.
Airbnb, of course, denied any responsibility. Jess Paterson said of Airbnb:“ It’ s like they don’ t care. They haven’ t provided us with anything: acknowledgement, apology, financial support for our ongoing needs. I sometimes get a bit depressed thinking of what’ s happened and what might have happened,” she added.
Airbnb said safety is its“ number one priority” and that problems like this are“ incredibly rare”, and said,
“ As soon as we were aware of the incident, we reached out to the guest to provide support”, but it refused to comment further on the basis that this is an ongoing case.
The vicims’ solicitor said the website has refused requests to provide financial assistance.
“ We provide all hosts in the UK with Host Protection Insurance which provides insurance coverage for up to $ 1 million in the rare event of an injury”, the Airbnb website says. However, it is not clear if this insurance applies, if a claim will be allowed and if so, if it will succeed.
Even if it did, the $ 1m limit applies to the total claim and all legal costs – which is unlikely to be enough for adequate compensation to four badly injured victims and to reimburse their legal costs.