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Comment by smelendez | Hacker News Reader

That's a tough problem. What do you think the proper solution would have been?

I think personally I'd want to stay in the apartment and wash with water heated on the stove and get a partial refund, but I'm sure that wouldn't work for everyone for a variety of reasons.

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We were on a romantic new years break. Washing each other using hot water heated in the tiny pans provided isn't really going to cut it ;-)

I had expected them to find us accommodation and pay for it, especially given the time of the year and circumstances.

Which, it's worth noting, Agoda did for a friend of mine on New Years Eve in Thailand last year.

Book them alternative accommodation and pay for it. I would guess it happens rarely, is a huge PR win for them.

I buy almost everything with Amazon because I feel I trust Amazon to make things right like that without question

Having been in a few not-great and weird situations after making purchases on Amazon, they've come through for me with a stellar performance every time. Better than any other company I've dealt with, though AMEX is almost on-par.

Really, their (buyer-side) customer service is fantastic and same with AWS. I'm not sure I'd want to be selling through Amazon though.

How do you get a partial refund? You have to submit to airbnb's arbitration process which is basically someone there making what (in our experience) were snap decisions. Broken shower for 4 days, stained sheets, photo and video evidence. Airbnb response? "You stayed there the full time, it couldn't have been that bad - no refund."

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