NEW Security for Hosts? I'm confused.

[Jillian115]

In the past, I had a pre-booking message that stated you must verify your government ID with Airbnb to book this listing. I understand that now with the NEW, more secure booking system. They may only require a legal name and address for bookings in the US, and "often these may be sufficient for us to verify your identity." I just received a message from Airbnb to update my instant book. The only change would be to turn it off because they have removed all instant book features. Am I missing something?

[Sybe]

Hi @Jillian115 ! We posted an update about the changes made to Instant Booking, which covers the ID verification you mentioned. You can read more about it here. 😃

[Jillian115]

Yes I read what you sent before I posted. I also read the version on the guest side that says name and address may suffice in the multi step verification process. Still confused as to how this is more security for hosts. 

[Helen3]

The problem with this change to the booking process is.... Airbnb now say

"The “pre-booking message required” option has been removed. If you'd like to continue to ask your guest questions at the time of booking, you can use the scheduled message feature to send a note to your guests after the booking is approved".

Is that it offers hosts no protection. When we could include vetting questions as part of the IB process if guests didn't answer them we would have grounds for a penalty free cancellation.

Now with the new system all we can do is use a scheduled message post booking. This give us no protection or ability to be able to cancel penalty free if guests do not meet our booking critieria.

How is this fair????

And before you say it you can only cancel three times on IB penalty free after that you have to ask CS to cancel for you and they will decide whether you can. 

[Nefar0]

thanks for the uptades

[Gillian166]

^^ reported Nefar

[Gillian166]

@Jillian115  yes, many hosts are now turning IB off. I was in another forum (where people say all sorts of honest things!) and it was quite funny to read the many responses which were "I've turned IB off". 

and yes,

I turned IB off last night. 

[Jillian115]

Thanks, Gillian. I’ll see if I can locate the post you referred to. I feel like I’ve been duped. After watching Brian Chesky’s video regarding the updates, I told my husband how great it was that they were working to protect hosts. Then I read the documentation. Sigh. 😮‍💨

[Gillian166]

@Jillian115 yes, I was also quite pleased with the new upgrades, but they are excellent at making those videos and creating hype. They have beautiful styling and everything looks wonderful, a bit like the notion of the devil wears prada, haha, but when we start to dig in to the changes, it's the ones they didn't tell us about that have betrayed the trust. Why weren't these changes to IB included in the Winter Release? hmm? why were they quietly implemented with zero info upfront?

They are now asking us to have faith in some new "multi step verification process" that they don't fully explain. It's vague and evasive. 

[Debra300]

We accept only long-term stays at our US listings, and want to keep IB enabled to boost our standings in search results.  We set the minimum stay to 26 nights and maximum stay is 27 nights, and the option to allow guests seeking longer stays to submit a reservation request.  We have never received a booking for either of these durations since the monthly discount is triggered for stays that are at least 28 nights.  Most of our guests want to stay 60 nights or longer so we usually get requests, and this gives us the opportunity to vet them.  

I understand why Airbnb wants to do away with the pre-booking message since other platforms don't require it, but on those OTAs the hosts have the opportunity to collect the guests credit card details, if they choose.  Also, at check-in hosts can also require that the credit card owner be one of the guests stay, and require them to present the card and their ID at check-in.  This is another move by Airbnb to put more of the burden of risk associated with hosting onto the hosts' shoulders.  

[Sybe]

Hi @Jillian115 and everyone!

I have some good news for you. After reading and sharing all your feedback, it's been decided to bring back the pre-booking message feature starting today, December 12th. You can read more about it here: https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Airbnb-updates/The-Instant-Book-pre-booking-message-feature-is-r....