FlipKey Reviews 

I have just read some of the negative reviews about FlipKey and feel that most of them are very, very unjustified.
In case some of the reviewers had not noticed, there is a global pandemic underway and this is impacting ALL companies to a

greater or lesser degree.

I have successfully rented out a holiday home with FlipKey for over 3 years now and yes, some of the payments are delayed

currently.
This is not the end of the world.
They used to pay out to us on the day after the guests had arrived. Now if can take up to 7-10 days.
THIS IS NOT A PROBLEM...
Especially since FlipKey announced this early enough for all to be aware of.

FlipKey - keep doing the great job that you are doing. I and my guests are VERY happy with you.

Do not list correct prices. Booked our honeymoon 6 months ago, only to be told a few days ago that the price on the listing was incorrect and it should have been double what we booked at! Contacted another owner for a property before booking to make sure the same thing didn’t happen again. The listing was for £3200 ish for 2 weeks…the owner said it would be £9000!!! Completely inaccurate. We were just lucky we have 3 months before our honeymoon. If it was much closer, we wouldn’t have been able to find an alternative.

Please note that their response says they have been in touch with me and this is completely untrue. I have only been in contact with the owner.

Flipkey always worked for me. Honoured all agreements. I have stayed in 2 diff. private Flipkey apartments in Barcelona, 1 in Vienna, and 1 in Bordeaux. I have stayed in someone's home (house or apartment) in seven different Flipkey's England (in one of them three times in three years) and in houses that were part or all rooming houses in 4 locations in England. In Canada, 7 times in someone's home (Toronto, Calgary, and Vancouver) and four times in an apartment in Toronto or Victoria. They have all been as advertised. When I left early due to dissatisfaction, I was refunded the amount (the host agreed to my leaving). When I lost a key to a lock, the host wanted $700 to install a new lock. Flipkey paid him $350 and didn't expect me to pay anything.

I had read many bad reviews and reports on people’s experience of trying to obtain a refund from FlipKey as a result of COVID-19. I just wanted to say that I completed the ‘extenuating circumstances’ refund process on Saturday and within 3 hours I had confirmation from FlipKey that my refund had been approved. Today I have received the money back into my bank account - 4 days including a bank holiday ! Thank you for dealing with my request so quickly and positively.

We own a lake house at Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. We were listed on FlipKey.com and TripAdvisor.com. We have a zero cancellation policy, because we only have 12 weeks during summer to generate rental income. A guy rented our Lake home during Memorial Day Weekend 2021. He was unhappy because the weather did not cooperate. He claimed he was unhappy because we have 2.5 baths and not three baths as listed. The site does not allow you to put down 2.5 baths. We are one toilet short of 3 baths. He was a small group of 7 family members, and lack of one toilet did not impede his use or enjoyment of our Lake home. He was pissed because the weather was bad and he could not enjoy the Lake. He never even reached out to us with a problem when he was at our house. Flip Key and Travel Advisor nevertheless just literally gave this guy a full refund, over $3,000, over our objection. Over lack of a toilet at our Lake house! This should tell you how they stand behind their hosts. Joke of a reservation site for hosts and home owners. Take your business to AirBnb. We get 95% of our renters through AirBnb and never have a problem with them as guests. Flip Key and Trip Advisor seem to be where the loser guests of the world seek comfort in, and no wonder when they get full refunds after staying at our Lake house and leaving unannounced due to the weather not cooperating. I'm an attorney and explained to them the difference between a material misrepresentation and negligible omission in an listing. A lack of a third toilet, for three adults and four kids, did not impede the guests' use of our house. Did not matter to Flip Key / Trip Advisor. Full Refund issued to the renter. Were out $3,000 on one of the busiest weekends at Lake of the Ozarks. We're removing our listing now from their service and going exclusive with AirBnb. The Shields

We stayed at Top Banana in Pigeon Forge, TN. it was amazing! The cabin was perfect! Updated, clean, well appointed and stocked. The view was breathtaking. Would highly recommend to anyone looking for a getaway for 2 couples!

I've been a part of Flipkey since 2015. I recently tried to rent 3 different vacation home and the owners refuse to reply each time, they just let the booking inquiry expire with no given explanation. This is the worst form of customer service I've experienced and I book rentals often.

I recently tried to book two apartments on FlipKey and both of them were denied with no real explanation except the owner could not accommodate us for those dates. They were not blocked out on their calendar and it didn't come up as unavailable when I entered my dates.
I rent through Airbnb all the time and have had no trouble, so I went back to them. Got a great place for my two week stay.

I want to book thru you guys but how could you reassure people they are not going to get scammed through you guys site??

BEWARE!!!! I booked a beautiful condo on the FlipKey website only to find out that my credit card number was then stolen and used to make multiple purchases. I was never able to confirm my condo rental, there was no response and the owner of the condo never received my request to book. This was a complete scam just to get my credit card information. I would NEVER book on this website and I would caution anyone else to book elsewhere for a legitimate experience.

My colleague used FlipKey for a recent accomodation booking in New York. I was surprised by the ease of use and simplicity. We found a great place at an awesome price. So the rest is all history... I joined Flipkey and will be using their services in the future.

I felt I needed to try to redress the balance slightly as I am a little bewildered by the extreme negativity of these posts. I have been both an Flipkey host and Flipkey user for the past four years and based on my own experiences feel that generally, with one or two exceptions, Flipkey offers a great service to both travelers and hosts alike. HOWEVER - Flipkey can only be as good as its hosts and as good as its users.

We have stayed in Flipkey accommodation in the UK, and abroad. When my husband and I travelled across the USA, we stayed almost exclusively in Flipkey properties with host families and with the exception of one bedroom in New Orleans, were generally delighted with the quality of the accommodations, and the friendliness of the hosts. OUR LAST EXPERIENCE WAS 10 DAYS AGO.

Flipkey was a life saver on one occasion, when, due to flooding we had to make a 300 mile detour. We had to cancel the Flipkey we were heading for (the host was wonderfully understanding and refunded our monies), and when we found that every hotel and b&b in the area was fully booked with families fleeing the floods it looked as though we'd be stranded. We checked Flipkey and found a home within 3 miles - they took us in immediately just asking an hour's grace to get the room ready! And it was a lovely room too.

Even the room in New Orleans was fine - however, in the photos, the curtains to the window were drawn. We found out why when drawing them back -there was no view, just a massive air conditioning unit filling the whole window. The hosts were also quite uncommunicative - possibly because they had such a high turnover they could not be bothered to chat to ALL their guests.

As hosts, most of our guests have been lovely and often very interesting people. One or two have been less lovely and have seemed to forget that our home is not a hotel, but they were in the minority. We have an ensuite room in our house, so we are on the premises. Most Flipkey issues seem, in the main, to centre around properties where the owner is not on site.

I am puzzled by reviews that state that the host has the opportunity to vet guest reviews before they are posted. That just is not true. The system is that guests and hosts can do one review on each other. Neither can see the other review until both have been posted or if only one review is posted, until 14 days have passed. Flipkey will send reminders to guests and hosts to do these reviews during this time span.

We always review the guest straight away. In most cases, we receive a review back. We also have the opportunity to leave a public response to a review once they both appear publicly - for example, one guest review suggested that our guest accommodation just had use of a bathroom on the same floor. We were able to set the record straight in the public response (our accommodation is ensuite).

I do agree that sometimes, Flipkey seems weighted a little unfairly towards the guest - if on the extremely rare occasion we had to decline a booking for very good reasons Flipkey responded by sternly admonishing us to ensure that our details are up to date and meet guest requirements (this after declining a guest who informed us that they were terrified of dogs and might scream when they met ours! Our details state quite clearly that we have a dog that has a full run of the house).

That said, when we have needed assistance or advice, Flipkey has been quick to respond. You do have to go through a procedure before making direct contact with them that can be irritating, but I think this is almost certain because so many queries and questions are the same. When we have written with an enquiry or problem, we have pretty quickly had a response back.

Generally, we are quite happy with Flipkey and would certainly recommend it to other potential hosts and guests.

Good luck to you all - guests and hosts alike and enjoy the experience!

I have booked 2 houses with them in the last 3 days and they have cancelled both my reservations within 24 hours of making them stating I did not send an additional $300 refundable security deposit via Cash App to the owner. They sent me a text from a different number that the booking confirmation and said they were the owner. I was lied to several times and the person even called me and could not even tell me his name and said he was the owner, then the property manager. ITS ALL LIES!!! They are trying to steal money! DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS COMPANY

We booked and fully paid for our vacation. One month before departure, the owner cancelled our reservation. Flipkey, Evolve, and TripAdvisor, all day the refund has been done. Well, we have yet to receive our money! $2176 would be the refund and have rebooked on our own. This is ridiculous! This is no fault of ours. We did not cancel, the owner did. We just want our refund! BR28133719.

Beware of unscrupulous property managers who take advantage of the 24 hour response period. We had one manager accept our booking then try a bait and switch for another property. When we declined the alternative bookings she asked us to cancel, which would have cost us 50% of the booking ($2,168). The web site states the manager should cancel the booking in these instances, but she claimed she could not. It took several attempts, but we finally got a refund. Stick with Vrbo and others who provide instant confirmation.

A am an owner that lists my 3 cabins on Tripadvisor (flipkey's parent). We have 5-star reviews. I use pricing software called Wheelhouse for rates. recently I got a request to book for July of next year. After I accepted the booking, I realized that the rates on TA/FK did not match those that Wheelhouse pushes. Basically TA/FK was showing some random rate to the traveler but not holiday 4th of July week rate. The rate shown to potential guest was about $800 less per week than it should have been. I updated the price and explained to guest the error, and that I cannot honor the rate that is $800 less than it should have been shown. Guest did not accept the alteration - understandable, so I said they can cancel. THIS IS A YEAR AWAY, so guest has plenty of time to book another property. Got a call from CS stating that to cancel, they will penalize me and change me $150. This is outrageous. CS is non existent when you have a problem, when calendars do not sync, but they jump right in when they can change you some outrageous penalty for cancellation A YEAR OUT. TA/FK has been also disconnecting calendar syncs lately. And this company constantly pushes owners to enable instant booking? with heir buggy website, calendars and prices not syncing, who can allow instant booking? I cannot!

Unfortunately I ended up getting sick the day before we were to arrive at Laurel Ridge near Nantahala River in NC to stay in a cabin. I was admitted to the hospital and had explained to TripAdvisor and Flipkey about the situation. The owner Steve Ballmer or Steve B. that I was pretty much screwed out of 700 dollars. I pleaded for some kind of resolution but the refuse to answer my emails. I understand the cancellation process but for Pete's sake, give me a break. I had food poisoning and there was nothing I could do, at least have a little compassion.

As soon as the dates moved for the Covid-19 cancellation policy I applied for a full cash refund and both were processed very quickly.

Our 1st check in was 29th June which I cancelled on 22th May and was refunded within a few hours.

Our 2nd check in was for 6th July and the cancellation window moved to the 15th July. I applied in the same way at 8pm last night and got up to an email saying all approved and refunded sent at 2am.

We had booked before the specified date so it was just a case of checking each day to see if the date range had moved.

A screenshot of the gov site was required to be uploaded as evidence. I did the UK showing our travel restrictions and one of France to show that we would not be able to get the certification to travel as non essential travel is also banned there. I also advised in the notes that our ferry operator was not yet permitted to carry non essential travellers.

I am writing this review to give hope as the reviews on here and elsewhere left me worried that we would struggle to receive a refund but the entire process for both was so easy. The only thing I would say when cancelling is to make sure all the dates are ok and when it shows on your booking that you can mow cancel, do not click any of the 2 options. Look underneath and click the link to apply for a full cash refund. That bit is a little hidden so you may go for a credit note in error.

All in all I would definitely use FLIPKEY in the future as I have received all our money back in full without a fight 10/10

Great website. No security lacking. Very fine options. As an host and guest, I recommend it.
You can chat with the owner directly, and if the host tries to trick you, FlipKey will save you.

Perhaps I have just been lucky, but I have been using FlipKey since 2013, and can only sing their praises. Out of extensive travel with FlipKey over the last 7 years, dozens and dozens of properties, I have only had 2 particularly negative experiences, one in Paris years ago, where the owner misrepresented the apartment, heating didn't work, it stank of smoke, and he was no show for hours. In that case, FlipKey stepped in when the discount he promised together with free 1st night never eventuated, not only did FlipKey efficiently resolve the issue, they gave me a token credit amount for my troubles. My more recent experience was in Rome, where an apartment management company failed to advise that major, major building works were literally outside my bedroom door, with metal banging, chainsaws etc, making use of the apartment after 0730 impossible. Sadly, yes, I had to video stuff at considerable risk to myself, I had to send photos, it was all very unpleasant, and I was hand-balled from one customer service person to another due to time zone issues, but in the end, they have given me 50 percent discount I think for all the nights/days that were affected. I say in today's cross-border customer service setups FlipKey are one of the best. I love the service, I recommend it to my family and friends, I used apartments all over the planet, and I have made some amazing friends. In many cities, I continue coming back to the same apartments year after year. I have only good words to say about FlipKey.