24 hour holds awaiting for payment

[Angel5045]

Can you get rid of the 24 hour awaiting on payment reservation.? Guest are obviously using this as a tactic to try the cheapest place available in the meantime nobody who is seriously interested in your place can see it is available . If they are going to allow that , it makes the most sense to leave your place open until that payment goes thru. This absolutely needs to be changed or give us the option to not allow that sort of thing to happen .  It is unfair to the host 

[Ricardo85]

@Angel5045 

There was already the option of not proceeding with the booking if Airbnb was unable to block the daily rates on the guest's credit card. But this option has long ceased to exist.

Ricardo

[Sarah977]

@Angel5045  No, this isn't a tactic used by the guest to shop around, because if they put in more than one request at once, which the hosts accept, they will be charged for all the bookings.

What it is, is that instead of making new guests enter all their info, payment method, etc, before they are allowed to try to book something, Airbnb lets them open a new account, book, and then it takes up to 24 hours for them to verify the guest and charge them.

It's a real annoying policy which all hosts hate.

[Angel5045]

Sorry that makes no sense . It has nothing to do with new users , so explain to me how she has 2 reviews ? She was not new . Also based on other post this is seems to be an area of frustration . Also what also makes no sense is you saying they will be charged ??? That is the point of all this , is that they are holding without any danger of being charged .  

[Angel5045]

Point being if they are going to allow this , it makes much more sense to leave the place available for others to reserve who are READY to pay . It makes more sense when they use this option that they in fact do not have a hold on a property and is subject to be reserved who is ready, period . That way it will put emphasis on the potential guest to make an actual payment rather than  blow off the reservation . Take a look at the other comments regarding this tactic . Its just common sense . 

[Debra300]

@Angel5045,

It is standard operating procedures for online booking agencies to hold reservations for 24 hours to allow guests time to fix problems with their payment methods.  I don't know if there is any law that requires this, but I've seen this also happen on reservations that came from Booking and Expedia.

[Sarah977]

@Angel5045  "Also what also makes no sense is you saying they will be charged ??? That is the point of all this , is that they are holding without any danger of being charged . "

The guest has no ability to hold the booking for 24 hours. The moment you click on accept, Airbnb charges them. If there is a problem with their payment method or other account info, then this payment charge is delayed and the host suffers a blocked calendar.

It's possible that this particular guest withdrew her payment info from her profile after her last booking, and therefore needs to upload it again, or the credit card co. is refusing the charge because she's maxed out her credit limit.

I had a lovely guest who said she deletes her credit card info after each booking because she had had her account hacked a couple years previous, with bogus charges made for bookings not made by her.

But I certainly agree with you, as I think all hosts would, that it is unfair to hosts to keep a calendar blocked for 24 hours while Airbnb tries to collect payment. That shouldn't be put on hosts, it should be purely between Airbnb and the guest. If the guest's payment fails, the calendar should immediately be opened and once Airbnb straightens things out with the guest, the guest can book again if the dates are still available.