Airbnb: deposit not returned

Airbnb has no general security deposit; some hosts with connected software collect one through the Resolution Center.

BCredibility B · last verified 2026-10-12 · dossier 2026-10-12 · 88% official or government sources

What does this mean?

Grade B (good: mostly official pages; check the flagged values before relying on them). 88% of 40 sources are the organization's own pages or government sites.

All Airbnb contacts Open in the interactive directory JSON

Collect

reservation code
deposit request
checkout photos

Steps

Check the Resolution Center for the host's security deposit request and its status.
OnlineResolution Center (send or request money; ask Airbnb to mediate) Sign-in required
If the host keeps the deposit without a valid damage claim, ask Airbnb to mediate within 60 days of checkout.
OnlineResolution Center (send or request money; ask Airbnb to mediate) Sign-in required

More contacts for this issue

OnlineContact Airbnb support (sign in to see options) Sign-in required

Facts you can cite

Policy
Resolution Center requests can cover security deposits from select hosts connected through software.
Source: airbnb.com, verified 2026-10-12
Fee
Guests pay a service fee of 14.1% to 16.5% of the booking subtotal; it is shown in the price breakdown before booking.
Source: airbnb.com, verified 2026-10-12
Policy
The US Terms of Service require binding individual AAA arbitration after a 30-day Pre-Dispute Notice, with a class action waiver; either side may use small claims court.
Source: airbnb.com, verified 2026-10-12

If that fails, escalate

Go up one step at a time. Keep the reference numbers and dates from each contact.

Customer service
OnlineResolution Center (send or request money; ask Airbnb to mediate) Sign-in required
Message the host first; then ask Airbnb to step in.
Written complaint
OnlineContact Airbnb support (sign in to see options) Sign-in required
Card or bank dispute
Fair Credit Billing Act billing-error and purchase-dispute rights (Regulation Z)
Electronic Fund Transfer Act error resolution and unauthorized-transfer liability (Regulation E)
State agency
Your state’s attorney general. Find it in the list of state agencies (also as JSON: states/<code>.json, for example states/ny.json).
Arbitration
MailPre-Dispute Notice and arbitration notice address (US Terms of Service, Section 23) CSC Lawyers Incorporating Service, 2710 Gateway Oaks Drive, Suite 150N, Sacramento, California 95833
Send a Pre-Dispute Notice 30 days before AAA arbitration; small claims court is allowed.

Watch out

Contacting Airbnb support and using the Resolution Center require sign-in by the account holder.
Only the guest who made the booking can report a Reservation Issue.
Mediation requests must be answered within 1 hour.

Let your AI agent handle this

Escalate Anything is a free, open-source MCP server for Claude, Cursor, VS Code, Gemini CLI, Codex and other AI apps. Your agent gets this playbook, keeps a case log with reference numbers and follow-up dates, and drafts each message for you to approve.

1. Set it up (needs uv):

uvx escalate-anything setup

2. Ask your agent:

Airbnb has not returned my [amount] deposit. Use Escalate Anything to get it back.

Source code, other install options and the Claude Code plugin