When the Place Does Not Match the Photos

Putting the Problem in Writing

Message your host in the conversation for the stay. That thread is the record both sides read, and where your host answers a change request, a money request, or a cancellation that requires their agreement.

A report to Kabora staff does not include the thread: staff see the listing, your name and the sentence the report files.

Requesting a Change

Open the stay from its message thread, or from the trip on your account page, and select Change reservation. You can request:

• Dates: Different dates for the stay.
• Party size: A different number of guests.
• Place: Another of the same host's places, provided the host has more than one listed.

Before you send, the new price shows the nightly lines, the new total, the current total, and the difference either way. Nights you keep retain the price you agreed; only nights you add are priced at current rates.

Your host can Accept or Decline, or send a change of their own for you to accept or decline. Nothing changes and no money moves until your host answers, except on a request that only adds nights, on a listing that approves extra nights automatically.

A second request replaces the first, so your host sees one live request. Both remain in the thread, the older marked Replaced by a newer request.

Requesting Money Back

In the same panel, choose Send or request money, then Request money. Enter an amount and what it is for; the request cannot be sent without both. You can request up to 60 days after checkout.

The request arrives in your conversation as a card. Your host has 48 hours to accept all of it, agree to part of it, or decline. Whatever your host agrees to goes back to the card you paid with immediately. Banks can take 5 to 10 days to display it.

Through Kabora, the amount cannot exceed what you have paid toward the stay, less the platform fee and card processing. The cleaning fee and taxes are not returned this way. You can still request more: the form displays the most that can return to your card, and anything more your host agrees to is settled between you, outside Kabora.

Your host decides. If you cannot agree, press Ask Kabora to step in on the card. This opens a case with Kabora's support team about your stay, and your host is notified. Someone from Kabora replies within 24 hours. Stepping in does not move any money by itself.

Canceling the Stay

Canceling follows the cancellation policy recorded on your booking, not what went wrong.

• You cancel: Before you confirm, the panel shows what you paid and exactly what comes back. The platform fee and the card processing are kept, and the policy's percentage applies to the rest.
• Non-refundable policy: You cannot cancel yourself. There is no refund figure and no cancel button, only Ask the host to cancel. Your stay remains booked until your host answers. If your host agrees, the refund still follows the policy, which on Non-refundable is nothing.
• Your host cancels: When your host cancels of their own accord, everything you paid comes back, fees included, whatever the policy says.

Kabora has six policies: Flexible, Moderate, Limited, Firm, Strict and Non-refundable. Every booking made on Kabora uses one of them; a booking on the host's own website may carry the host's own policy. Read the policy named on your reservation. The help article "Cancellation Policies and Refunds" describes the six.

Reporting the Listing

Partway down the listing page you booked from, press Report this listing, then select "It is not what the photos showed". You must be signed in.

Staff read it as a guest stating that the place does not match its listing, with anything you typed in the box. It goes to Kabora staff, not to your host, and joins a queue that staff work through and mark resolved. A report does not move money or generate a reply to you, and has no case number or status to check.

Reviewing the Stay

You can review once the stay is over. A review left from your trip or your message thread records an overall star rating and your comment, and nothing else.

The invitation email opens the longer form, which asks you to rate accuracy, meaning how well the place matched the listing, along with cleanliness, check-in, communication, location and value. Accuracy is where this problem belongs, and it is what the next guest reads.

Your review stays hidden, from your host and from the listing, until your host has reviewed you or 14 days after checkout have passed. The same applies to what your host writes about you, so neither is written as a reply to the other.

What Kabora Does Not Provide

Kabora provides no automatic refund for a place that was not as described, and no rebooking service that finds you another place. Your options are the five above:

• The thread with your host.
• A change request.
• A money request, with Kabora stepping in if you cannot agree.
• The policy's refund.
• A report to Kabora staff.