Instant Book Allowing Anyone?

[Shannon998]

I have had Instant Book on for some time now and have the criteria checked that only allows guests to book who have had previous stays without incidence or bad reviews.   I keep getting bookings from guests that have no stays, no history at all, barely a profile.  Some show they have been a member of ABB for years and this is their first booking.   Am I missing something in the settings?  Not sure why this is happening.

[Paula]

Hello @Shannon998, this indeed looks unusual.

Have you contacted the Airbnb support team to review what might be happening? In the meantime, I am reaching out to our lovely Host @Joan2709 to see if she has any suggestions regarding the settings in Instant Book.

All the best,

[Shannon998]

Thank you Paula for your help. Joan did reach out and was helpful, along with customer service we figured out what we were doing wrong. Thank you!

[Paula]

Thanks for the update, @Shannon998. Glad to hear this was resolved. 😊

[Joan2709]

@Shannon998 

Hi!

Hmmm...this is strange. We have instant book set on one property and we do get a request to book if they have no reviews. There was a "bug" awhile back where this wasn't working correctly. Below is a screen shot of how our addl settings look. However, it sounds like you have these set properly? 

You may try turning off instant book and logging off your Airbnb account. Then immediately go back in and turn it back on and verify the additional requirements are set. You didn't say if you use require a pre-booking message. We do require it, but not sure if you didn't require it would have any effect or not?

[Shannon998 · Accepted solution]

Hello Joan, thank you for your reply, I was able to get resolved with Airbnb customer service.  It was user error on my end and not understanding how to correctly set up.  Thanks again.

[Oliver-And-Jennifer0]

What was the user error. I just had a literal nightmare with an instant book with no reviews. 

[Oliver-And-Jennifer0]

I re-checked my instant book settings and all correct. So how did this happen? I just turned off instant book. I have never had a problem in 7 years of hosting. 

[Shannon998]

My user error was I did not understand the Instant Book Criteria.  I was under the impression that when I turned on the restriction that only allowed guests with good reviews and previous stays that they were being screened by the system.  In my case, what I was missing was that the system was allowing guests to instant book if they had previous stays, with or without a review.  The only one's that were screened out were the ones that had no previous stays or the ones that other hosts had checked the review box that did not recommend them to other hosts. 

When I was getting inquiries to stay, I was not allowed to see the profiles / photos of the ones requesting so I assumed they had already been approved by the system screening and were just asking for specific dates or questions before booking.  I realized my mistake that not all have been pre-screened like I was understanding them to be. I'm not sure if it was a quirk with the ones that booked with me, or the bug Joan spoke of. 

I have noticed since then that there have been some guests try to book and have ask a question that has noting to do with their status, I think just to see if I will reply and approve without realizing.  That is what I was doing before.  Now I refuse the ones I do not trust and have had a few that were very suspicious or I have found had bad reviews.