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How-to • Guest

Paying and communicating through Airbnb

It's against Airbnb policy for hosts to ask you to take your booking off of Airbnb or to communicate outside the Airbnb platform through a messaging service (e.g. WhatsApp, Facebook, etc.), text, or any platform other than Airbnb prior to booking. If you choose to pay for your booking outside of Airbnb, you will lose the AirCover protection that comes with booking through our platform for no extra cost.

Aircover protection

With AirCover, you’ll have access to our global Community Support team, who are on hand 24/7 to support with booking assistance, refunds and reimbursements—and to prevent fraud. AirCover also supports you if there’s a serious issue with your reservation that you can’t resolve with your host.

Paying outside Airbnb

In some cases, hosts may ask you to pay outside of the Airbnb platform, but all mandatory charges must be included in the listing’s price breakdown at checkout. Any payment for optional amenities should be sent on Airbnb using the Resolution Centre.

Leaving Airbnb also makes it harder for us to protect your information and puts you at greater risk of fraud and other security issues, such as phishing. If you pay via wire or bank transfer it may be a fraudulent reservation. To get help, let us know immediately. You can always check if your reservation was booked through Airbnb.

If a host suggests you pay for the reservation outside of the Airbnb platform or communicate outside of the Airbnb platform prior to booking, please report it to us immediately.

We protect you and the Airbnb community

We do our best to keep you safe by reviewing messages on the Airbnb platform. We’ll block potentially dangerous messages that contain words or numbers that might include contact information or references to other sites, including external links. 

If you get a suspicious message, let us know by reporting it or flagging it.

Learn more about our Privacy Policy.

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