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Airbnb, other vacation rental companies face renewed pressure over home elevators
Previously at DU:
Wed Jul 14, 2021: Another child dies in home elevator accident, days after regulators pushed for recall
Business
Airbnb, other vacation rental companies face renewed pressure over home elevators
Death of child in N.C. spurs calls for change
By Todd C. Frankel
Today at 5:00 a.m. EDT
Shortly after a young boy was crushed to death by an elevator inside a vacation home in North Carolina last month, federal regulators turned to vacation rental companies for help.
They asked firms such as Airbnb and Vrbo to require homeowners to shut down residential elevators inside their rentals until a safety inspection could be performed. The Consumer Product Safety Commission said in its letter to the companies that regulators were “writing to urge you to act immediately to protect consumers — especially young children — from the dangers posed by residential elevators in the homes for rent through your platform or agency.”
Several of the rental companies told The Washington Post that they would issue warnings but stopped short of agreeing to require safety checks and home elevator closures. ... None of the companies indicated they would fully follow the agency’s recommendations for dealing with what the commission described as an “extreme hazard.”
This was just the latest attempt by safety regulators to deal with a danger that has been allowed to persist for years — despite an easy and inexpensive solution. A 2019 Washington Post investigation showed that the elevator industry spent decades denying responsibility for devastating home-elevator incidents, with regulators divided over how much power they had to take action.
At a Senate hearing last week to consider the confirmation of three new commissioners, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) said she sent a letter to the commission asking the agency to focus on the safety of elevators inside vacation rentals “where people may not be familiar, may just be there for a few days, may not understand the risk.”
{snip}
The 7-year-old boy who was killed in Corolla, N.C., on July 10 was on the first day of an Outer Banks vacation with his family from Canton, Ohio, authorities said. They were staying at a rented beach home. Authorities said some close calls have occurred in other rental homes at the popular tourist destination.
{snip}
By Todd Frankel
Todd C. Frankel is an enterprise reporter on The Washington Post's Financial desk. He joined The Washington Post in 2014 and previously worked as a reporter at newspapers in St. Louis; Everett, Wash.; and Charleston, W.Va. Twitter https://twitter.com/tcfrankel
Airbnb, other vacation rental companies face renewed pressure over home elevators
Death of child in N.C. spurs calls for change
By Todd C. Frankel
Today at 5:00 a.m. EDT
Shortly after a young boy was crushed to death by an elevator inside a vacation home in North Carolina last month, federal regulators turned to vacation rental companies for help.
They asked firms such as Airbnb and Vrbo to require homeowners to shut down residential elevators inside their rentals until a safety inspection could be performed. The Consumer Product Safety Commission said in its letter to the companies that regulators were “writing to urge you to act immediately to protect consumers — especially young children — from the dangers posed by residential elevators in the homes for rent through your platform or agency.”
Several of the rental companies told The Washington Post that they would issue warnings but stopped short of agreeing to require safety checks and home elevator closures. ... None of the companies indicated they would fully follow the agency’s recommendations for dealing with what the commission described as an “extreme hazard.”
This was just the latest attempt by safety regulators to deal with a danger that has been allowed to persist for years — despite an easy and inexpensive solution. A 2019 Washington Post investigation showed that the elevator industry spent decades denying responsibility for devastating home-elevator incidents, with regulators divided over how much power they had to take action.
At a Senate hearing last week to consider the confirmation of three new commissioners, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) said she sent a letter to the commission asking the agency to focus on the safety of elevators inside vacation rentals “where people may not be familiar, may just be there for a few days, may not understand the risk.”
{snip}
The 7-year-old boy who was killed in Corolla, N.C., on July 10 was on the first day of an Outer Banks vacation with his family from Canton, Ohio, authorities said. They were staying at a rented beach home. Authorities said some close calls have occurred in other rental homes at the popular tourist destination.
{snip}
By Todd Frankel
Todd C. Frankel is an enterprise reporter on The Washington Post's Financial desk. He joined The Washington Post in 2014 and previously worked as a reporter at newspapers in St. Louis; Everett, Wash.; and Charleston, W.Va. Twitter https://twitter.com/tcfrankel
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