Ng Wei Leen, vice president for Asia, said, “Asia is the second most important continent for us so far, just after Europe. I’m proud to say that we established an office in Asia before any of our competitors did.
“I think that it is a strong statement of intent from us. We are extremely keen to experiment more with the audience in Asia to discover where are the cities that are most amenable to try a new travel experience.” 
Fronted by former-Qype and Lastminute.com executive Stephan Uhrenhacker, it also became the first provider to offer its hosts worldwide protection for their properties last August.
Said Uhrenbacher, at the time of signing the Worldwide Host Protection Plan, “We go to great lengths to ensure that both our hosts and guests have the best experience possible when travelling with 9flats.com. Anyone who rents out their own home with our service now has further peace of mind that their property is protected.”
The company expects that claims will be rare – in the six months since 9flats.com was founded, there have been no claims over €100 – claims which, until now, 9flats.com has paid out as a gesture of goodwill, said the company.
Said Ng, “We have the best protection of any company in this business, in any part of the world. Period. Our competitors are at least an order of magnitude behind us. Our policy with Zurich insurance has worldwide coverage, and we were helping stranded guests find solutions before anybody ever started thinking about the security aspects of this mode of traveling.”
According to Ng, a key priority for 9flats has been to ensure the same high level of customer service in Asia as it has in Europe. “This puts us at a cost disadvantage from day one, compared to many of our competitors where customer service is just a web form. You cannot go AWOL when your users are stuck in a foreign city and, by protecting our users, we hope to protect our unique advantage in the market.”
The key challenge remains getting inventory. “There are lots of people who have never entertained the idea of short-term lets. Those who are familiar with short-term lets are the first ones to jump on the bandwagon, but they are few and far between.”
Ng said that in general, “transactions are increasing across the board both in terms of quantity and value”.
“Customers satisfaction is also on the up. Our obsessive focus on customer care is starting to yield rewards, and the pressure on us to formally roll out to other parts of Europe and Asia is tremendous from our users. It is a great problem to have.”
In an interview with WIT, Robert Rosenstein, CEO of Agoda had observed that the challenge with the short-let apartment rental market was one of structure. “It’s not about supply and customers, it’s about structure and rules and how you bring the authorities into it? That’s where the battle will be won – creating structure,” he had said.
Agreeing, Ng said, “The structure of a reputation system, community behaviour guidelines and a method to exclude anti-social, fraudulent accounts are all important building blocks for any company with transactions between users.
“We see a lot of questions about liability and support. Hosts run great risks by inviting strangers into their home. For that reason, we as the platform have to provide security and assurance to hosts whenever possible. We have our industry leading insurance programme, and world class customer service.
“We respect local regulations and share information on such regulations with our hosts. The rules can be very convoluted, as in New York, where you can have someone stay in your apartment if you are living there with 3 other family members, but not rent out a spare apartment somewhere short term. We are working on protecting our hosts and arming them with the best information available all the time.”
He however disagreed with Rosenstein’s claim that the battle will be won on whose structure is better. “A safe and friendly platform is no substitute for great value. We find that people come to us expecting to receive a better deal than what can be had at a traditional hotel.
“Our most popular places are those that look amazing, have a great location, and are relatively inexpensive. If you can get a kitchen, balcony, barbecue pit, fireplace and pool for less than it costs to stay in a suite, there is no question that you would go for it.”
Plans to localize 9flats for markets in Asia are in the pipeline “and we are on schedule to deliver,” said Ng.
