The bigger concern from the merchant's side is that they are almost always swallowing the refund. The refund is not being provided by the card issuer or payment

The bigger concern from the merchant's side is that they are almost always swallowing the refund. The refund is not being provided by the card issuer or payment network, they just remove it from the merchant's (in this case AirBnB's) account. Declining a charge in this way is thus less insurance, and more telling the merchant "I am not paying you." While it may be justified (like in this story), the merchant is never going to be happy about losing those funds and losing the control over the funds. I had a similar situation with the App Store where I purchased a subscription under a mistaken assumption and when I could not find any recourse through Apple or the publisher (I simply could not find any way to get in touch with anyone), I declined the charge on my credit card. This led Apple to block all activity with that card - so much so that I was unable to download any free apps until I added another payment method to my profile. When I attempted to contact Apple to resolve this issue I was told that it was "for my security", to prevent further fraudulent transactions on my card. Explaining the situation, and that there was no fraudulent use of my card or account, just a misleading subscription did nothing to help. They insisted that the only way to resolve the situation would be if I reversed the dispute from the credit card (thus releasing the funds back to Apple), and only after that was completed would I be able to try to get a refund from Apple. Left with no other choice that is what I did. The issue at hand here was obviously that Apple was refusing to give up control to the credit card companies. By effectively banning any user that disputes a charge they are able to force their users to keep all complaints within Apple's purview (and they do not provide a way to submit complaints digitally).