VRBO Guest Charge Back or Payment Dispute

[SunandFun83]

I cancelled more than 20 reservations for March and April. I offered guests the opportunity to re-book using hold points or a discount if the owner week reservation was cancelled.

Most guests were pretty good to work with. Two VRBO guest have started credit card payment disputes.

My direct rental require a rental agreement with a no cancellations clause. My VRBO ad said "No Cancellations"
Wondering what your experience has been with chargebacks.

I had a rental at Marriott Canyon Villas to E. Wong on VRBO. We talked around March 12th and I followed VRBO recommendation of providing at least a 50% refund. E Wong filed a dispute asking for 100% additional refund , plus $500 in VRBO taxes and fees. I made a mistake by not getting a signed acceptance from him before refunding 50%

I had a reservation at Marriott Ocean Pointe to R. Stearnes. He called to cancel because Spring Baseball was cancelled. (I did not sell him baseball tickets). He did sign a strongly worded acceptance of my offer to make a replacement reservation. I sent him a list of 10 existing reservations to choose from on May 21st and an invitation to search 120 days ahead. His credit card dispute notice arrived on May 23rd.

How have you been dealing with chargebacks? Has anyone let VRBO take the money and gotten their money back when the guest case was proven to be faulty?

I am so irritated that a guest who accepted a 50% refund and a guest who signed acceptance of a future reservation are disputing payment.

 

[montygz]

I can't help with the chargeback process, but I will say It's easy to dwell on the negative in these customer service matters.

With only two issues out of 20 guests, and the rental chaos the pandemic created, I'd say you are doing pretty well.

 

[Quilter]

Even though Sun had only 2 instances of charge backs, I'm sure he was constantly connected to phone and computer while he worked with the other 18+.

Sun did VRBO actually get money back from you?

 

[SunandFun83]

A friend expressed concern about charge backs. I emptied my bank account linked to VRBO. The chargeback is like an AVH. It bounced. No money withdrawn.

VRBO was passed and locked my calendar as closed. I am hoping the charge back will be denied and I can open again. Not much renting now in Phoenix anyway.

yes, I did work hard contacting guests to cancel. I asked for a signed agreement on replacement reservations. I hope that will lead VRBO to deny the second charge back.

 

[SunandFun83]

Like an ACH. VRBO was pissed.
I emptied my PayPal account also

I emailed both guests to ask if they made a dispute after getting 1/2 refund or signing an agreement. No response.

 

[emeryjre]

Did the 1/2 refund go back to their credit card?

 

[SunandFun83]

Did the 1/2 refund go back to their credit card?

It went through VRBO, supposedly that went back to the card used to pay VRBO. The out of pocket for the guest was around $1,400 plus taxes and fees after refund. The charge back was around $3,400.

 

[emeryjre]

So the chargeback requested the entire amount of the renter’s payments? There was no consideration for the amount you had already refunded. What a mess. What evidence do you have that you made the refund? Did you make the refund through the VRBO system?
(Edit and add here) After thinking about it, my guess is that VRBO did not process the refund to individual's credit card. Individual gets frustrated by lack of 50% refund and takes only action available to him, file a dispute with credit card company for the entire amount. Just a guess.

 

[Laurie]

It went through VRBO, supposedly that went back to the card used to pay VRBO. The out of pocket for the guest was around $1,400 plus taxes and fees after refund. The charge back was around $3,400.

So the chargeback requested the entire amount of the renter’s payments? There was no consideration for the amount you had already refunded. What a mess. What evidence do you have that you made the refund? Did you make the refund through the VRBO system?
(Edit and add here) After thinking about it, my guess is that VRBO did not process the refund to individual's credit card. Individual gets frustrated by lack of 50% refund and takes only action available to him, file a dispute with credit card company for the entire amount. Just a guess.

VRBO has been very very very slow at actually crediting travelers' cc's after cancellations, even though they say they have done it - AND slow at debiting property owners' accounts - like over a month, maybe going on 2 months. But eventually they do go through. We are dealing with some of that on our wholly-owned condo we rent out thru VRBO, and their snail's pace
on this.

That doesn't answer your question about the traveler disputing the entire amount, or what to do now that the dispute is filed, but when you say "after refund", they possibly had never received any refund yet, and had lost confidence in your representations. Had you been debited? Did you speak with VRBO customer service? etc.

On refund issues with everyone, both as a traveler and as an owner, I've had to practice an unusual amount of patience - these companies have been so slammed with requests, beyond their abilities to function at normal speed.