How often do you decline?

[Kelly149]

Those of you on Request only, how often do you decline?

Recently I had a mediocre request that I cajoled and prodded into reading the listing and answering the booking questions and he rated VERY poorly afterwards. Sure wish I'd have just booted him to begin with.

So, then I had a few folks that I typed and typed for all the "I'm sorry to be a bother, but you seem to have missed a couple things" emails which led to retracted requests, so I didn't have to decline but those messages are a big time suck.

So, then the last 5? 6? didn't read anything, had totally blank profiles and didn't answer one lick of the pre-booking message and/or House Rules message I just went ahead and hit decline and said "It is recommended that you read the full listing and the House Rules prior to making a Request to Book. Best of luck for your trip!"

And now I'm wondering how soon I'll get the ABB nastygram message telling me to do better and "accept" more guests??

[Helen744]

@ Helen744 I do IB all the time and  rarely get requests but 

when I do I generally decline them because they usually want something not listed or I should say  they are only enquirys and never proceed to bookings so they are automatically eliminated Also I request a full face id and no avatars or obscured faces as I have a certain amount of face blindness. I sometimes am not sure if the person who turns up is actually the person who booked as a living person can look very different in reality. So who knows?I have discovered something about the non communicating guests that I did not realise but do now. since i have been adding to my rules that guests must have a 'working mobile phone during their stay"  so that we can keep in touch . I have realised that often with older couples only one has a functioning phone as such. The other has often booked online  and the phone is rarely used.So messages sent to that guest often are simply not answered and unless they use their desk top every day the Airbnb messages are not picked up . this adds to the super annoying bunch who book and then disappear into the woodwork until suddenly they cannot find the house address. Newbies generally . Any solutions gratefully accepted

[Hugh0]

After declining 6 in a row, ABB will automatically suspend you for 7 days. Happened to me recently. After accepting 42 bookings over the last 30 days, I had a group contact me. I declined them for no reviews, no profile (and no courtesy).  Each member of the group then made the same request in turn.  This tripped the 6 declines in a row and I was suspended. No appeal. 10 years of hosting and 1200+ reviews means nothing 😞

[Debra300]

@Hugh0,

Thanks for sharing.  It sounds like the lesson learned is that a host should contact customer service to inform them that after the initial decline multiple requests were submitted from different members of the traveling party, and request that the subsequent declines be changed to penalty free.

[Hugh0]

Unfortunately it does not operate like that. The decline counter cannot be reset by CS. There is no point calling them. I was actually advised that it would have been better for me not to respond and take a hit on my response rate.

[Debra300]

@Hugh0,

Customer service could have declined or canceled the booking request on your behalf.  They probably have little wiggle room to adjust host declines after the fact though.

[Huma0]

@Hugh0 

I did not know about the six declines in a row thing. Thanks for sharing.

@Debra300 

I have tried exactly the same thing as you suggest and it doesn't work. Airbnb CS told me that even if they cancelled with 'no penalty' to me, my acceptance rate would still be dinged. This happened a few times. When I questioned why they had mislead me, they responded that acceptance rate means nothing so I hadn't really been penalised.

[Huma0]

@Debra300 

It's been my experience that CS will cancel an instant booking for you but, unless it's the guest that wants to cancel and you have agreed to it, it still counts towards your three penalty free cancellations (and, yes, even when it's the same clueless guest rebooking after you've cancelled them). So, what's the benefit?

Even if they decline on your behalf (which they rarely do, as they just tell you to do it yourself), your acceptance rate will still go down. It counts as a host decline. I have experienced this every time. They just tell you that it's fine because acceptance rate doesn't matter. 

[Huma0]

@Hugh0 

Well every CS rep I have spoken to advised the opposite. They said that acceptance rate didn't matter and it was better to take a hit on that than response rate which is both a criteria for Superhost and also displayed on your listing. So, that made sense at the time...

[Pat271]

@Hugh0  Yeah, I’ve often wondered about this. I have had situations where I declined due to lack of info, and the guest submitted a new request with the required info. But what if the same guest just keeps submitting new requests without complying, either because they are clueless, or because they are just trying to be obstinate?

I’m assuming this would be similar to your case, in which multiple people from the same group attempt to book the same dates over and over. Before declining myself, I would think that I could call CS and they would have choices such as calling the guest, blocking the guest, etc. I would also hope that there would be some repercussions for the guest as well (warnings, suspensions, etc.). I can’t believe you were told it was better to just take the hit on your response rate! That seems like bad (and probably incorrect) advice.

[Huma0]

@Pat271 

This has happened to me and also with guests repeatedly IBing, even though I had cancelled them and explained why. Some people just won't take no for an answer.

First recourse is to try to convince the guest to cancel/withdraw the request from their end. Second is to call Airbnb but they are most likely to ding you anyway. Best solution I can offer is to block the guest so that they are unable to contact you/send a request.

[Normen0]

@Kelly149  I try hard not to decline but to convince them to withdraw.  Just had one request this week with a 3.5 rating and one review that said they smoked in the door way and the smoke permeated the house and had more people than they booked. So I asked him if he was able to ensure me that no one would smoke in the apt or open doorway or have more people than booking for. He said he would withdraw his request. Apparently he couldn’t commit to my request!  Perfect!  The first honest potential bad guest I’ve (not) had!  
If I’m not getting what I need from them, I like to tell them that they may want to withdraw their request to remove the hold on their credit card. Usually works.  

[Ann72]

"I like to tell them that they may want to withdraw their request to remove the hold on their credit card."  Love this @Normen0 - will definitely use when needed.

[Suzanne302]

@Ann72 It works like a charm! Since we know they technically don’t put a hold on a credit card, I use the line, “If you withdraw your request within the next 12 hours your card won’t be charged.” 

It may “imply” their card would be charged without the withdrawn request, but technically,I’m not lying! 

[Ann72]

Great wording @Suzanne302 - I almost used it last night on an IB that had no communication and only one guest in the reservation.  Instead I put a change request through and that got him to talk and accept the change.  But I'm definitely keeping this in my back pocket.  

[Christine615]

I've never been dinged for declining. If they don't have good reviews and prior recommendations from previous hosts they have to "request to book."

If they don't read the rules or answer my questions (which are in the listing as required) I will query. If I get only a first name, or the head count is off, etc. then I decline and check the box that my listing is not suitable.

My favorite is that my max is five. But i get a lot of requests for parties of 6 but the booking is only for one person. Lol.

My house, my rules and my co-host lives on site so I'm not about to put a risk in the other unit. Airbnb doesn't do much to vett the guests so we have to do it. It's time consuming but the few times i didn't trust my gut I had less than ideal guests.