An Airbnb landlord in Edinburgh has been banned from the site after posting a listing with the words “please don’t book if you are asian”.
Airbnb has handed the landlord, Stephen Sheppard a lifetime ban and the advert for the Gilmerton Road flat has been removed. He justified the racist remark by saying he has had “bad experiences” with Asian guests previously.
Sheppard’s listing was discovered by an Asian IT worker, who was looking for accommodation in Edinburgh.
The IT worker told the Daily Record: “This act by the ‘host’ is the worst type of violation you can perform on this platform. If you are deciding to make your property available on a platform such as this to generate an income then the rules do not allow you to discriminate in this fashion, period. If you have a personal resentment towards a specific group of people then do not use this platform.”
He also said that Airbnb should do more to monitor listings and ensure racist listings do not appear, adding: “Airbnb have chosen not to scan house rules or look for discriminatory listings when they quite easily can.
“They have given importance to their revenue stream over discrimination as possibly the process to implement is not cost effective and thus they rely on the users to see and report.”
An Airbnb spokeswoman said: “We have zero tolerance for discrimination and have permanently removed this host from Airbnb.”
