NYC's Host Registration Verification System Isn't Ready on Airbnb Crackdown Day
06.09.2023 - 03:43
/ skift.com
/ Dennis Schaal
September 5 was the first day of New York City’s short-term rental registration rules, but the city’s electronic verification system isn’t operational yet, Skift has learned from three sources familiar with the new process.
The system is meant to help the city’s Office of Special Enforcement communicate with short-term rental platforms like Airbnb to ensure they aren’t accepting bookings from unregistered hosts.
Under the historic new registration requirements, hosts with shared rooms need to obtain registrations from the city to legally accommodate a maximum of two guests, and the hosts need to be present during the stay. The city had granted only 257 registrations as of August 28.
In a court filing in June, Airbnb, the largest short-term rental operator in the five boroughs, noted that the Office of Special Enforcement is supposed to send platforms the name, address, listing url, and host registration number through an electronic verification system.
When the platform’s information doesn’t align with the information the city sent, then the platform can’t verify the listing.
“When a verification fails, Airbnb must remove the listing in order to avoid the civil penalties,” Airbnb said in the court filing
The same would hold true for other platforms verifying the city’s short-term rental registrations.
The platforms could face penalties of $1,500 per transaction processed from an unverified listing.
The potential penalties are moot at this early stage. If the city’s electronic verification process for host registrations isn’t up and running, it would be hard-pressed to issue fines to the platforms for noncompliances. Two sources said the city doesn’t intend to aggressively issue fines to the platforms for any noncompliance during the early stages of the new regulations.
The city is believed to be dealing with a backlog of host registration applications that it hasn’t even reviewed yet. The city’s Office of Special Enforcement didn’t respond to a request for comment.