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> Trivial to verify addresses on Airbnb side. Not trivial at all. Without even pausing to think, I could offhand list at least four different ways of writing

> Trivial to verify addresses on Airbnb side. Not trivial at all. Without even pausing to think, I could offhand list at least four different ways of writing my home address that would be impossible for AirBNB to automatically disambiguate from other (potentially) different residences, without actually visiting the building... but which would be perfectly unambiguous for a guest who actually visits. Address verification is hard. Not impossible, but when you're operating in many cities and countries that have wildly different ways of organizing their addresses, it's not trivial at all.

jackgolding 10y ago
I think it sounds like a good idea and I agree address verification is hard but is it worth the risk? I imagine this would throw out all insurance liability if things go wrong.
- chimeracoder 10y ago
  > I imagine this would throw out all insurance liability if things go wrong. AirBNB doesn't offer insurance - it offers a "guarantee", which is legally different in an important sense. In any case, if you're looking to rent out your place full-time, you probably don't really care about AirBNB's guarantee anyway.
_delirium 10y ago
Some countries (like the UK) have a widely used address registry rather than freeform addresses. And most online shopping services have figured this out (even multinational ones that ship to many countries), so I doubt a company as large as AirBnB would have technical trouble doing so if it really wanted to. The way it works when I order online: I first enter my postal code, then it shows me a drop-down box with the valid addresses in that postal code (there are exactly 16 of them), then I choose one of those. Online merchants like it because it reduces chances of fraud/misdeliveries/etc. (their contracts with parcel delivery services might also require it).
- peterjmag 10y ago
  Agreed. The USPS also provides address verification / normalization services. [1] Though I'm honestly not sure those are as comprehensive as certain other countries, as you mentioned. Germany has the Meldepflicht[2] for instance, which requires all residents to register their address with an Einwohnermeldeamt, and I'm pretty sure that's validated against a nationwide database. Granted, it's not granular enough pinpoint exact apartments (since apartments aren't generally numbered here), but still, I imagine that kind of thing would make it pretty difficult to bypass a law like Amsterdam's 60 day rule. [1] https://www.usps.com/nationalpremieraccounts/manageprocessandaddress.htm https://www.usps.com/nationalpremieraccounts/manageprocessan... [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meldepflicht https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meldepflicht
  - germanier 10y ago
    There is no nationwide database of that kind in Germany. The data is kept local (but there are mechanisms to access it from another place in certain cases). The address you give them is often not validated and many people have a typo in their official address causing all kind of mayhem.

jackgolding 10y ago

I think it sounds like a good idea and I agree address verification is hard but is it worth the risk? I imagine this would throw out all insurance liability if things go wrong.

chimeracoder 10y ago
> I imagine this would throw out all insurance liability if things go wrong. AirBNB doesn't offer insurance - it offers a "guarantee", which is legally different in an important sense. In any case, if you're looking to rent out your place full-time, you probably don't really care about AirBNB's guarantee anyway.

_delirium 10y ago

Some countries (like the UK) have a widely used address registry rather than freeform addresses. And most online shopping services have figured this out (even multinational ones that ship to many countries), so I doubt a company as large as AirBnB would have technical trouble doing so if it really wanted to. The way it works when I order online: I first enter my postal code, then it shows me a drop-down box with the valid addresses in that postal code (there are exactly 16 of them), then I choose one of those. Online merchants like it because it reduces chances of fraud/misdeliveries/etc. (their contracts with parcel delivery services might also require it).

peterjmag 10y ago
Agreed. The USPS also provides address verification / normalization services. [1] Though I'm honestly not sure those are as comprehensive as certain other countries, as you mentioned. Germany has the Meldepflicht[2] for instance, which requires all residents to register their address with an Einwohnermeldeamt, and I'm pretty sure that's validated against a nationwide database. Granted, it's not granular enough pinpoint exact apartments (since apartments aren't generally numbered here), but still, I imagine that kind of thing would make it pretty difficult to bypass a law like Amsterdam's 60 day rule. [1] https://www.usps.com/nationalpremieraccounts/manageprocessandaddress.htm https://www.usps.com/nationalpremieraccounts/manageprocessan... [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meldepflicht https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meldepflicht
- germanier 10y ago
  There is no nationwide database of that kind in Germany. The data is kept local (but there are mechanisms to access it from another place in certain cases). The address you give them is often not validated and many people have a typo in their official address causing all kind of mayhem.