@Daryl3 if the policy is the same there as in the UK, then the new extenuating circumstances does not apply to your guest as he already checked in. The normal long term policy should apply, I.e. you are supposed to be paid for any nights he stayed, plus 30 days after the cancellation and he is then refunded the rest.
HOWEVER, be very careful because Airbnb is currently refunding guests willy nilly, even if their stay is not covered by extenuating circumstances. In the past few days they have refunded two of my long term guests all of those 30 days, plus nights they actually stayed. In one case, they refunded the guest for the whole stay, including the two weeks she had already spent here.
Bear in mind that both guests had agreed to pay for all the nights they stayed + the 30 nights, and I don’t just mean contractually by agreeing to the cancellation policy when they booked, but told me they wanted to pay this because they thought it fair. They were due to stay 2-3 months more and were getting refunded for the rest. One of them was getting accommodation costs refunded by her university anyway, so wanted that money to come to me. She offered to pay me directly, but silly me, I chose to play by Airbnb rules...
Once Airbnb got involved though, they started to make a number of mistakes and refunded the guests incorrectly. The guests then started to change their minds once those refunds had been issued and wouldn’t agree to give the money back because, they said, they were scared Airbnb would overcharge them by mistake or charge fees twice etc. All their good intentions went out of the window.
Never mind that these guests were not entitled to full refunds (again, their bookings do not fall under the extenuating circumstances) or that Airbnb CS messed up the refunds, Airbnb doesn’t care.
They have admitted that they made mistakes and that I am entitled to that money according to their own policy, but are simply saying what’s done is done, we can’t fix it now. Well, they could do something because they could alter the amounts of the refunds that are still pending, but are doing nothing.
I have not only lost the income, but it has caused unnecessary tension with guests who left on very good terms, happy to pay what was owed.
Sorry for the long story, but please be careful. Airbnb are not only changing their policies, they are not even sticking to the new policies they’ve put in place! Also, they could update them at any time and what I have said might no longer be relevant to you.
