Homestay.com Arvostelua 5 900

Tuve un problema con un alojamiento que había reservado por dos meses, lo encontré en malas condiciones de limpieza, así que me decidí a dejarlo y poner mi reclamo a homestay, después de unos días, envio de la evidencia y que puedan hablar con el dueño de casa, me devolvieron el dinero que había pagado por adelantado y la comisión de alquiler. Así que lo recomiendo, me parece que estas cosas también hay que decirlas. Ojo que fue la primera vez que tuve un problema, en alojamientos previos mi experiencia muy buena.

Our experience with this website was ABSOLUTE SHOCK HORROR. We booked a room for a month in Lewisham (10 mins away from Surrey Quays). As soon as we arrived, things went downhill fast. The host, who was abroad, was spamming us with calls non-stop, demanding immediate full payment and even yelled to us over the phone. She then texted to say that her son would come over to "MAKE SURE YOU ARE OUT OF MY HOUSE". We paid up as we were genuinely scared of what she could be capable of doing to us, only to find the room infested with massive BED BUGS. When we complained, the landlady suggested moving to another room, but it was just as bad – FILTHY AND SMELLING OF ROT. The room was filled with TRASH AND DIRT. We couldn't bear to stay another night and left the next day immediately. We reached out to Homestay describing the situation in detail with evidence attached of the horrific conditions of the house as well as the host's aggressive and disrespectful behaviour, but they were completely indifferent. They did not comment on what happened, their attempt at resolving the issue amounted to nothing more than a refund. This essentially means that this type of behaviour is not being stopped and more victims will follow. We deserve financial compensation for the DAMAGE the bed bugs have caused to our personal belongings and having no choice but to spend the night in a ROOM FULL OF GARBAGE. I am completely baffled about their reaction to all of this to say the least... HOMESTAY DOES NOT CARE ABOUT YOUR SAFETY AND DOES NOT DISCIPLINE THEIR HOSTS - STAY AWAY OR FACE THE CONSEQUENCES.

PLEASE DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY. I recently booked a stay with this company. the host was beyond rude. she invited friends my 2nd night and played movies so loud. I was unable to sleep after a busy day. It was 11 pm and they were still yelling. I checked out 2 days early because I could not believe, the host was so disrespectful. I called the Home stay phone number to find out it reverts you to the online site. So, there is NO one to speak to. I sent the complaint online, just to get that it's all my fault because I left early and did not tell anyone. The host lie that she made no noise and even called my phone and yelled at me as to why I was complaining. I was never given my refund for nights not stayed and Home Stay stopped communicating with me. DON'T BOOK ANY STAYS ON THIS SITE. You are not able to leave a review of the host also.

The website allows the host to write offensive reviews. In my case the host publicly judging my and my partner's standards of order and cleanliness when, fortunately, there are no absolute standards of cleanliness but each people and culture has its own and it is really offensive to express oneself like that, as if the host's standards were worth more than ours. In addition, but it is difficult to prove, the host's comment is clearly racially based, even though it does not appear explicitly in the review. The site considered it appropriate not to take a position. I strongly advise against using Homestay, other platforms are more transparent and less tolerant of discriminations!

Dear Homestay, first of all, you write “Maybe you should instead consider that when you rent a room in someone's house”. I can tell you with certainty that the one where I slept is not the house where the host lives, but simply a house rented out to tourists, just like any b&b. When you see the house, it is very clear that this is not and cannot be the host's main residence. When I travel and pay handsomely for a room, I do not do the cleaning at the end of the stay but there is someone who is paid to do it when I leave. Like anywhere else. Then you write “some types of behaviours are not liked by the owner”. Dear ladies and gentlemen, how do I know what types of behaviours are not liked by the owner?I need a crystal ball to know that! Do you provide one for guests? When renting to international guests, homeowners should be open, tolerant, flexible people who do not judge based on their standards but who know and respect the individual's cultural differences of guests without judging them wrong. Furthermore, I also disliked some of the landlady's behaviour e.g. her intrusiveness, inappropriateness and racism. There are two of us who disliked each other's behaviour but Homestay clearly protects the hosts regardless and it is very sad. Considering the number of negative reviews you get about your website, maybe you should change something!

the lady I stayed with in London was a complete mental case. she was so obsessed about the money, she didn't want to rent the place except to get a quick cash, and she would go into the room to do inspections when I'm not there and complains about packet of biscuits because it was open but In the box and if something was not where she wanted it to be. it was a traumatising experience to live with someone who constantly blows over nothing. and not respect you and think its ok to kick you out which she did, when I came back from my late shift over imaginary insults. I would much rather pay more on other services than living with people like this. she had the audacity to play really loud club music till 6AM and then when I complained in the review she would say she was honouring her late father!! oh yeah, that's how you honour your father by drinking, smoking, and playing loud bad quality music and dancing by yourself while annoying everyone within hearing range. I swear the walls vibrated, I had to put my big Bose headphones with noise cancellation and put loud white noise just so I wouldn't lose my mind. I told her to lower it 2 AM she replied gotta hear my music then threatened me later on WhatsApp "done ever speak to me like that again" completely unstable and the website doesn't care. she says I'm the worst out of 14 but then the website allowed her to write a new review and change it to 20. she told me about one tenant who led to a rodent infestation, one who damaged the wall so she had to repaint it, and one who left while they agreed he would pay for the next month, and I'm the worst because I wrote a bad review about her. completely unstable. she would stay in and annoy you with nonsense while you are at uni/work and you go back to inane complaints over nothing, and she would ramble on and on because you are polite and then goes on to flipping on. she's awful but I guess in her head she's nice, what a nutter.

I have been a host with Homestay.com for a year. Some issues have been resolved by them, and I found them to be helpful and professional.

I booked a room in Battersea, London with an older lady with cats, the house was disgusting and there was a man there hanging around, (not specified in the description). The place was so dirty (i.e: hairbrush full of old hair on the table with food). I have pictures but I am not able to upload them on here, however I sent them to Homestay. I told them I didn’t feel comfortable staying there, their reply was “the house is just lived in”….. no it wasn’t, the house hadn’t been cleaned in weeks (maybe more). I am sorry but if you are expecting a paying guest you have to make an effort and do some basic cleaning….. Homestay refused to help, they just automatically sided with her. I had to make a big fuss, the team was so rude and argumentative, in case you call just be aware if you speak to the 2 agents I spoke to, I can’t give names but I assume by their names and accents they were Spanish or possibly Italians, nothing to do with their nationality by the way. These 2, a woman and a man are not meant to work in customer service, they just want to win an argument, not interested in helping at all. Also I asked for a manager to get back to me, almost 2 weeks later I’m still waiting, either they didn’t log a complaint either the manager doesn’t care either…. This was my first and last time with homestay...

24/01/24 - I had to edit the review because Homestay has made a complaint and requested I remove the names, I guess they are not very proud of the service provided and maybe ashamed of the performance….

I've been traveling for quite a while now, and staying with a local resident has definitely been one of the best experiences I've had so far. Homestay.com offers excellent hosts who likely become lifelong friends. The website is fantastic, and it's refreshing to find a company with outstanding customer service.

My homestay host unfortunately had to cancel my booking 3 months beforehand. I emailed Homestay.com to ask when I could expect my booking fee to be refunded. I got a response within 1hour to say that the refund had already been put through and it should show in my bank within 3-5 working days (which it did).

So I was happy that Homestay.com was reliable when I emailed them with a concern and they issued the refund the day after the cancellation.

I stayed in a room in Barcelona (Brumelys) where there were 2 other men living (not specified in the description) and one of them was smoking WEED! (it was written non smoking place in the description). Homestay refused to help or give any refund or compensation. You better use AIRBNB instead of this platform. This was my first and last time with homestay...

I asked homestay to mediate my dispute with a landlord. They simply dismissed my concern without investigating. The site does not offer any protection from landlord abuse.

I will explain why hosts should never use this site. And the site better not put up a response to this, since they are one of the worst sites on the web and they can't talk their way out of this....

First, I am in a good-sized city and they have zero guests listed that are leads for us to follow up on. And I have gotten zero bonafide inquiries in the months I have been on here.

Secondly, they somehow sent me a lead. He didn't show up on the list in my city, but I got the lead anyway. He had inquired at another place, but they sent the lead to me too. This means that if you were to get an inquirer that they would just send it out to tons of other hosts! In addition, they actually lowered my rate that I would get! Yep, just lowered my rate out of the blue!

Thirdly, this guest only wanted to pay $849 for a one month stay. Why would I, or any other professional in this business, take a booking at this rate, or even the rate that they "suggested", when I can get that rate for a long term stay?? In other words, I can fill it at that rate for a long term stay to some local person and they are wanting me to take that rate for a one month stay and then have to do it all over again, enduring marketing time, turnover and most likely a vacancy period.

This site is a total waste of time. Even Craigslist is 100 times better and it's free! I have been renting out as a host for 20 years and never seen a site as bad as this.

IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR A HOMESTAY IN DUBLIN, IRELAND. STEER AWAY FROM PATRICIA'S HOMESTAY.

READ BELOW:

**Stay Away - Nightmarish Experience!**
My stay at this homestay was nothing short of a nightmare. The host's behavior was beyond concerning; they displayed clear signs of mental instability. From the moment I arrived, it was evident that this was going to be an uncomfortable stay.

First and foremost, the cost for this accommodation is exorbitant compared to what's offered. Despite the high price tag, there was nothing but disappointment. The host's control over guests is suffocating. I felt as though my every move was monitored, and I was far from being treated as a paying guest.

The host's behavior was not just controlling but also verbally abusive. Their unwarranted aggression was both shocking and unsettling. It's clear that this person should not be hosting guests, as they have the potential to harm others emotionally and financially.

What's worse, I was evicted from the property with absolutely no warning. This was entirely the host's choice and fault, yet they kept my money, refusing to cancel my booking. It's a blatant disregard for the rights and comfort of guests.

Regarding the condition of the house, it was far from acceptable. The cleanliness left much to be desired, and guests were inexplicably limited to one shower per day. Access to the kitchen was cut off after 8 pm, and showers were prohibited after 10 pm, imposing unreasonable restrictions on daily life.

The number of rules and the demand to be invisible and silent were oppressive. Basic services and freedoms were stripped away, making this stay unbearable. Even something as basic as laundry was restricted to one load per week, despite the high cost of the accommodation.

Should you dare to point out any wrongdoing, be prepared for threats of police involvement and eviction. It's a hostile and toxic environment that no one should endure.

What's even more distressing is that the website, which facilitated this booking, was fully informed of the host's behavior and chose not to take any action. Their customer service proved utterly useless, refusing to help no matter how dire the situation. They wouldn't even refund the booking fee, which they should have. In my attempt to address these issues, I discovered that the website's headquarters in Dublin had no real office presence, only serving as a post-receiving location.

This experience is nothing short of a scam, both on the part of the host and the website. None of the hosts are verified, so the safety of your homestay is not assured. I am currently pursuing legal action against both my previous host and the website itself.

In conclusion, exercise extreme caution and avoid using this website at all costs. It's better to find alternative accommodations than risk your well-being with hosts suggested by this platform. Your safety and peace of mind are worth more than any homestay they offer.

If I could give a zero, I would because they don’t deserve any star. I’ve been hosting for almost 10 years, I’m a customer service manager. I use Airbnb for almost 7 years and started to try Homestay this year and they are far far far from Airbnb in terms of hosting and travelling. The guest and host have all the risks and have to solve the problems all by ourself. There job is just get the guest and host in touch, after that they won’t do anything for you. There are one situation where I have a problematic guest in a room (who destroyed the room and didn’t want to leave) so I offer my future guest who has booked to have another room instead if I’m not able to have the room. Homestay intervenes to say that I’ve breached the terms and service and gave a very rude response to my solution in the middle conversation with my guest and say that they monitor everything. What a bad move as it creates distrust between us and it’s not solution oriented! So, I have no choice than cancelling the guest so he could have time to book somewhere else and finally I was able to solve the matter and have the room available for the guest. I also have another issue with a guest who doesn’t follow the rules (smoking weed in her room and always have incense lighted which could create a fire hazard, not cleaning after her mess in the kitchen and bathroom, took my kitchen bowl to clean her personal objects (wig), use sugar in the bath and created an ant infestation, have issues with all the roommates, her room is so dirty that she always hide it) The name given by Homestay is not even her real name. She is giving me so much troubles and one day her wifi stops to work, she hassles me to get it repaired right away. I told he I would do it the same day but I didn’t have my key to unlock the service room so Ill be back tomorrow to do it. It’s been less than 48h without internet, she called Homestay to tell that she did not have internet for 3-4days and Homestay also desactivated my account. What the hell?! Oh and they are still contacting me to ask me go check on the wifi even I’m no longer a member of Homestay! You desactivate a host while they are still hosting a guest and ask them to go check on the wifi for the guest?! Are they completely lost their mind? You are creating unnecessary conflicts between the guest and host while there’s still an ongoing reservation. Airbnb would move the guest in a new place and then desactivate the host if it was for serious matters after the guest moved out. As the result, I didn’t even have a security deposit from the guest so I don’t know what’s gonna happen. So keep in mind that Homestay can’t do anything for you. They just keep the money for linking you to the host. They are just helpless, inexperienced and mindless customer service.

Hier das Statement auf meine Anfrage bei Homestay ..."Es tut uns natürlich leid, dass Sie keine erfolgreiche Annahme erhalten haben, und würde daher gerne wissen, ob Sie es vorziehen würden, wenn wir Ihr Konto schließen, wenn Sie mit dem Service unzufrieden sind,.."
Ich hatte erwartet, dass Homestay ihre Anbieter in Schutz nehmen, von deren Gebühr leben sie ja immerhin.
Aber der Kunde wird bei nicht zufriedenem Service, das Schließen seines Accounts angeboten ? Was für eine Dreistigkeit.
Statt den Anbieter zu ermahnen und an die Regeln und Pflichten zu erinnern, oder eine Lösung des Problems zu finden, wird der Kunde ausgeschlossen. Also für mich hat sich Homestay erledigt. Meinetwegen können sie meinen Account schliessen. So eine Kundenbehandlung bei Problemen muss ich nicht akzeptieren. Was passiert nur wenn es mal wirklich ernsten Stress zwischen Kunde und Zimmeranbieter gibt. Das möchte ich lieber nicht erleben. Dann einige Euro mehr ausgeben und bei seriösen ÜBN Buchungsseiten z.B. Booking.com Arbnb buchen. Da kümmert man sich wirklich, wenn es Probleme gibt, oft genug erlebt.
Alles Gute für das weiter Bestehen Ihres Kundenunfreundlichen Unternehmens.
Uwe Grund
Holzwickede NRW

A guest requested to stay !longer and later wrote a really intrude nasty review saying I didn't clean the room When he had requested that don't enter the room to clean and he would clean it himself. I cleaned all the rest of the house well and he lied about that in his review. He also made false allegations that I was spying on him through the curtains from the garden.This is ludicrous as he had requested to stay longer. When I contacted HomestayThey said that this is the guests experience in spite of his lies and then said they are not going to remove the contradicti one of this malicious person Altogether Homestay are on the side of the guest even if they lie.

As a host, it's risky to list a property on Homestay. I got a few guests, one was a depressed man like fleeing the USA. He never left his room, he barely took a shower in 2 weeks, spent his time eating, he was praying Torah in my dinning room on Shabbat. Since I'm more like a mother Teresa, I was concerned by his physical and mental health. After 2 weeks of concern, the guy left and it took days to ventilate the room and rewash the bedclothes. There is no discrimination, simply that person was not a common traveler. He was not a bad person, just strange (trying to convince me that vaccines are bad, that the world is bad, that I should become Jewish).
The cherry on the cake was a disturbed lady from Austria - a marketing influencer - "I am special, I am vegan, I am sensitive, I carefully choose what I eat". A specialist of "I'll pay you tomorrow" for 3 days. This was just a few days before I got fixed the powerful internet. She was unstable and not willing to comply with the rules of the house. After the clash - without even paying the overnights, she wanted me to incurre into expenses to equip her laptop which I absolutely declined (!!!), I performed my own research and noticed that on FB, Twitter, Linkedin she got different names, same photos but changed her name in different platforms. Of course she never payed the nights she stayed at my place, she left the room and bathroom smelly, disgusting, full of long curly dark hair.
What I fund unfair is that Homestay never publishes the bad reviews so it's become a sewer and allows unstable people to find rooms. Homestay only published the good ones, those of normal people open to travel and willing to adapt to other cultures.
HOMESTAY's system - even if one accepts their rigged abusive rules - is far from being honest and any nut can book at your place and we - hosts - are unable to discern and decide our faite by reading real reviews. On the "magic world of Homestay everybody is adorable". Crap!
If you wish to know the names of the nut "traveler" let me know. I will not share the Canadian guy who got sick, letting him the benefit of the doubt.
So no, I do not recommend HOMESTAY. They can remove my listing, and mostly, watch their rules!

Questions? Reach me out!
=====================
12/5/2023 - Reply to Homestay
For the depressed Californian and the sick Canadian, the automatic reply to my reviews was "Nous sommes désolés d'apprendre que votre séjour ne s'est pas bien déroulé. Si vous souhaitez discuter d'un point particulier de votre expérience de l'hébergement chez l'habitatnt, n'hésitez pas à nous contacter. Nous sommes prêts à vous aider".
Fine, thank you. However the reviews were not published.
For the Austrian "influencer", since the customer service was involved, they proceed to the cancellation of the booking therefore I was not asked "Nous aimerions connaître votre sentiment sur l'accueil de Stefanie". For the 3 bad experiences, they don't have a review. The reviews published are only the good ones. Rigged!

DO NOT USE!! Terrible customer service!

The host I stayed with fabricated lies about me so he could take my deposit.
I asked to assistance from homestay and their response was:
“The disagreement between yourself and the host, Brian, must be solved among yourself. Unfortunately, as we are not on the ground and privy to the happenings, it is impossible for us to take sides or do anymore we have already done when dealing with both parties.”

The didn’t do anything! There advise “ we really do urge you both to try to come to an agreement on this matter.”

Obviously if I could solve it myself, I would. Hence why I asked for help. When I posed this, they just started ignoring me.
I’ve had to email them from different address to find out why they ignoring me - they ignore me again! I asked to an apology, received nothing!

I have had to call them, and they still give me the run around.

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!!!!
Terrible!