Airbnb Preventing legitimate Bookings. Blocking Bookings

[Regis-and-Christi0]

So, I’ve seen several people mention that bookings have gone down in my area. Well, I have as well, didn’t think much about it until a friend tried to book my home for the end of the month. 24 days from the time of check in, for 2 people. He tried 4 times. He lives out of state.  And he gets the attached message!

This is not ok. Airbnb should leave it up to me to decide what booking to take or not. It’s very common to get last-minute bookings around the holidays because people since Covid and just want to take a last-minute trip. I vet guests pretty extensively when it's the day of or few days of, and let them know that we don't allow parties and have cameras on the outside of the property. Which will weed out the Parties, so in regard to parties, I am very strict and proactive. But prevent a booking for 2 people, from out of state, 24 days from now? That seems pretty absurd.  And what is up with the message “you can still book hotels”??  I have gotten nothing from Airbnb as of late, and I'm usually booked out this time of year.  I have had no issue with parties. Can this be a glitch in the system?

[Huma0]

@Regis-and-Christi0 

This is not new. It started happening at least as early as spring 2020. There were a few posts about it here on the CC around that time. After hosts started making a fuss about it, I think the message was changed, as it was originally pushing the guest only to book a hotel (conveniently around the time Airbnb was really trying to push their controversial and badly rated hotel acquisitions). Seems they are still up to old tricks...

[Helen3]

Hello @Regis-and-Christi0 

Airbnb has at least for the last two or three years had a policy of trying to negate high risk guests from using the platform because of the risk of these guests partying/damaging your property and the attendant bad publicity and risk that local government will ban STRs in your area as a result.

Personally I am happy they are doing so.

Sadly sometimes good guests get caught up in their algorithm

Absolutely it is your property and when you take direct booking you can undertake the risk of accepting whoever you want. However if you want to use their platform to market your STR business, you need to play by their rules, whether it using their cancellation policies or accepting they will restrict high risk guests to minimise anti-social behaviour/partying/damage to your listing.

If you find their policies too restrictive, then there are other listing companies you can use and you can invest in setting up your own marketing channels and advertising to promote them.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Regis-and-Christi0 if this is a friend why on earth are they not booking direct and saving you both a total of 20%?

[Sudsrung0]

@Mike-And-Jane0 

Maybe they was doing a test run

[Regis-and-Christi0]

Well... they are an acquaintance from high school 30 years ago. I like the security of not having to deal with deposits and such.  But you're correct... I could have not dealt with the hassle booking on the platform.

[Helen744]

Hmmmm , very odd response and a bit scary. Are they indicating that you or your friend may have a party? I do not get this at all. do you have 'no parties advised ' ? there is no way to make this judgement. Verrry odd.    H

[Regis-and-Christi0]

Hi Helen

WE are very clear that we don't allow parties.  So, not sure where the red flag would have come from. The person I knew booking, was only coming with another person in a 6 -9 person home and doing so from out of state. very odd.

[Bhumika]

Hello @Regis-and-Christi0 ,

Did you also try connecting with Airbnb Customer Support for this? For more information, I guess that will be the best way to get answers to your queries.

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[Regis-and-Christi0]

Hi there,

Yes.. we did contact Customer Support. They advised the guest contact customer service because they saw nothing on our end.  When the guest did so, customer support told them that it was a computer auto generated response and there's nothing they can do.