Avand Amiri

Budget to a "Free House" @avand/budget-to-a-free-house-7b53eff6ac89" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">medium.com/@avand/budget-… The story of purchasing my first home and how budgeting made it possible.

Running commercials during the presidential debate is so damn American it makes me sick.

@gonzalo__nunez So basically just hijack your pleasure center with sugar to make sure you enjoy something.

Pretty amazing how well this generalizes outside of the game of golf to something like computer programming, for example. Great framing all around.

And just to close the loop… Airbnb is doing nothing to compensate me for the irrecoverable revenue. They are completely tone deaf as to the core issue. They’re claiming it’s related to me changing my minimum stay. What?!

I have hosted hundreds of reservations and maintain a 4.9 star rating as a SuperHost. God knows the service fees Airbnb has made as a result. I’m super grateful for the product to create this financial opportunity for me. But man, they make it so frustrating sometimes!

Some of blocked dates were for the following week so making them available meant they would likely go unbooked. Inevitably, both listings sat vacant for a week, which never happens.

@BMorearty @Airbnb I might also add that I was told once by a Product Manager at Airbnb that sharing my experience helped shaped some work internally. 💡

@BMorearty @Airbnb I’m just trying to be hopefully. 🤞 Who knows? Maybe if we can give it some sizzle, the other Brian will get this folded into the next launch. But I won’t hold my breath.

I don’t love to blow up a product’s spot due to a bug. But this one from @Airbnb is spectacular and the way it’s being handled is so stereotypical to Airbnb’s support I have to call it out in hopes of some change.

That means that Airbnb lets a 3rd party app make changes to MY calendar via a co-host. Even though I’ve never authorized that app. This is insane! It’s a fraud vector, a bug, a security vulnerability, a huge nuisance, and it probably cost me business.

I Googled “smartbnb” and discovered that it’s a 3rd party integration (perhaps formerly Hospitable): smartbnb.io. I asked my co-host if she knew what this was and she said that another host she works with had set it up recently.

I tried unblocking the dates and within a few minutes they were blocked again. Then, I changed my co-host’s access to be more limited, removing her ability to make calendar changes and that stopped the blocks from happening.

It’s also worth noting that the agent was great. She did the best she could and I felt supported (even though there was no resolution).

I called Airbnb and reported the issue. They were not able to explain what was happening so I took debugging into my own hands. Fun fact: the CX agent was reporting the bug using software I wrote when I worked there!

One day, I woke up to a bunch of random dates being blocked on my calendar. The same dates across both listings were blocked. There was a note on the block like “Smartbnb <reservation-code> Airbnb.” I didn’t block these dates. I called my co-host and she didn’t either.

I have two vacation rentals listed with Airbnb. I also have a co-host that helps me with the listing management. She chimes in from time to time to read or reply to messages on the app. She had full access to both my listings but I had to limit her access to workaround this bug.

Typing is a great modality for interfacing with a computer. I don't think it's a great way to connect with humans. If you want to connect, send me a voice memo or call me please.

My work on Awedience at Airbnb landed me a patent and makes me feel proud. patents.google.com/patent/US11646… What is Awedience? medium.com/airbnb-enginee…