I booked the "Laverne" back in February. I got a message from the hosts letting me know that the side curtain airbags had been singed in a grease fire, that they might not be working, and needed to be replaced. They were still renting the van regardless, and asked me to sign an airbag waiver, which I was not comfortable with. I brushed it off, was friendly and flexible, and agreed to switch to another van in their fleet ("Shirley") even though I was disappointed. Looking back, it's a red flag to me that they're still renting out a vehicle whose airbags are compromised and asking people to sign waivers outside of the Outdoorsy platform.This one wasn't a big deal, but they asked for my second driver's insurance which was strange to me because we obviously paid for the Outdoorsy mandatory insurance. We called Outdoorsy and they could only help us with license verification, so we proceeded without.They had listed the check in time on Outdoorsy as 11 AM. When I went to review all the details for van check in, I noticed Bri listed the check in time as two hours later at 1 PM in her message. I asked her about it, and she said the van would be ready at 11:40 at the earliest, and I didn't get the go-ahead that everything was ready until after 12 PM. This was inconvenient for us, as we had to pay for multiple Lyft rides to and from our Airbnb. Again, I just rolled with it and was flexible and friendly. They charge people for both early check in and late check out, but did not offer us anything for the discrepancy.When we got to the van the check in went fairly smoothly, although the state of the van was different from the photos. They clearly put a lot of work and attention to detail when they first got these vans, but unfortunately ours hadn't been maintained. The very cool and fancy fridge / freezer listed was instead a missing cabinet drawer and replaced by a dorm-ready mini fridge without a freezer. Things were scratched and dented, there was a big circle of gluey residue on the dash from the last phone mount. There was duct tape on a couple things, including the fan and one of the lights outside. We decided to pick our battles and make the best of it. It was a birthday trip I'd been looking forward to for a long time.Only a handful of hours after check in, we tried to lay down and use the combo vent fan above the bed. We have the exact same one / remote in our van at home, and are familiar with how to use it. The air wouldn't blow in. It only functions as a ventilation system to, for example, vent air out if you're cooking in the van, which isn't allowed anyway. It doesn't blow air on you, and without it the van honestly isn't habitable in this very hot and humid climate. Even after dark, we couldn't be in the van for more than a few minutes unless we were driving around with the A/C on.We messaged Bri and Connor, who suggested a few things to troubleshoot. We had already tried them all, but said no problem and sent videos of us doing the things they suggested. Connor apologized a couple times and offered to switch us to another one of their vans.At this point, we had spent a fair amount of our own time and money trying to accommodate them. We had already noticed several more discrepancies in the listing, including:- TV / DVD was listed under Entertainment amenities
- Leveling jacks are listed under Other amenities
- Heater is listed under Climate amenities
- The latch on the back of the vanity cabinet was broken, so it would swing open when you had the van door open
- Said we were welcome to use the van at festivals in one place and that they weren't allowed in another placeOf course we didn't need a heater because we were melting, and weren't attending any festivals, but the point is that the list goes on. There were a lot of loose ends. We're pretty reasonable people, but at this point we weren't up for trying a third vehicle with them. Even so, we tried really hard to be kind and solution oriented. Bri's attitude towards us and the situation were disappointing.- She made herself out to be going above and beyond for "contacting Outdoorsy on my behalf" when we first had to switch Laverne for Shirley, as though I was causing the need for coordination.
- She kept saying the fan was functioning, which was super frustrating to me. It was not, in the most important way, which is why Connor apologized. Her argument was that the listing didn't specify airflow direction... give me a break. It had duct tape on it for goodness sake.
- She blamed the other discrepancies on Outdoorsy platform updates.
- She tried to justify the important things that weren't in line with "extras" she put in the van that weren't in the listing, like playing cards and toilet paper.
- When we let her know we were bringing back the van per Outdoorsy's instructions, she gave a rude response of "that's totally your prerogative." I responded by saying "Just trying to keep you informed hun. We're really trying to stay value aligned even though things didn't work out." No reply.We returned the van the next day. It was frustrating and stressful, and I ended up laying in bed with an ocular migraine for a good chunk of my birthday. It was supposed to be a "luxury, newly renovated" van and for $250 a night, it just didn't deliver. We're in the process of getting this all to Outdoorsy for a dispute and our money returned.As a side note, I was somehow enrolled this morning in Bri's outside business marketing emails for "Bri at Ember." This is a newsletter for her "Community Strategist" Consulting and I surely never signed up for this. I hope they're able to tighten up the loose ends be successful in the future.
