Online accommodation booking giant Airbnb is set to launch travel insurance that will help the platform’s customers get reimbursed.
The outlines still remain unclear, but Airbnb officially announced on Thursday that it would be ” about to launch travel insurance ” which would cover in particular the cancellation, a case which has not been uncommon for two years due to the pandemic. The platform is already facilitating refund procedures for travelers with Covid-19 who are forced to cancel their stay, even if it goes against a host’s cancellation policy. But because the crisis affects both hosts and travelers, Airbnb will launch a solution that will reassure customers, while also preserving its guests.
While waiting for insurance, Airbnb offers a support program for travelers
This solution consists of travel insurance, which Airbnb obviously adapts to its activity and to the current context. Set up with an insurance company called ” deemed but whose identity is still unknown, it should be launched during the coming spring. For the time being, Airbnb still advises its travelers to take out traditional travel insurance outside the site, to avoid any unpleasant surprises. From this spring, therefore, travelers will benefit from an internal platform solution.
But in the meantime, the company’s US headquarters has announced that it has launched a support program to relieve customers who would no longer be able to maintain their trip due to the various disruptions linked to the pandemic, such as border closures or the potential quarantine requirement.
In the event that a guest cancels their stay and fails to obtain a full refund of the sums advanced, in particular due to the host’s cancellation policy, Airbnb offers to compensate the losses in the form of a trip. The value of this coupon will be around 50% of anything that could not be refunded by the host.
Retroactive application, but case-by-case treatment
Initially, Airbnb will provide this program with an envelope of 20 million dollars. The company announces that it takes effect immediately and that it can even apply retroactively to reservations which provided for an arrival date from the 1er December 2021, when the world again tensed up by taking more drastic measures to contain displacement.
Trips canceled due to border closures or other travel-disrupting measures are eligible for the program, the California-based company promises.
Airbnb explains for example that if a user has booked, in October, a stay planned for December in a country which is then closed to travellers, he is eligible for the program. On the other hand, it is not if he books a stay in the same country today, having already been informed of the same measures taken. In short, Airbnb will have to deal with requests on a case-by-case basis.
On the same subject :
Airbnb paid 93 million euros to French municipalities in 2021, via the tourist tax
Source: Airbnb
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