Stopping a booking of a 1 star guest before it happens

[Menna6]

Someone is trying to book my Airbnb. I have instant booking if they have  good reviews. This person gas one star and xero stars on cleanliness!! and a 'No Comments' as a review. He is yet to confirm his id but when he does it looks like he will becautomatically be booked into my place which I am not happy about! Help how do I stop this booking before it occurs??

[Anonymous]

@Menna6   I don't quite understand what phase of the booking process this guest is already in, or why your Instant Book settings would allow a guest without positive reviews to get through. But if it's not already booked, you should be able to turn off Instant Book, decline the guest's request, and re-evaluate whether Instant Book is truly for you.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Menna6 you probably can't stop the booking (perhaps block a day in the booking timeframe). Instant book does allow 3 penalty free cancellations per year so this is probably the best solution if/when they book with you. Just call Airbnb on 02033181111 and ensure you get a penalty free cancellation.

[Huma0]

@Menna6 

I didn't know you could give a guest 0 stars for cleanliness or for any other category, but this is obviously bad.

Agree that you should use your penalty free IB cancellation on this one. Feeling uncomfortable about the guest or believing that the guest will break your house rules are cited by Airbnb as valid reasons to cancel penalty free. In theory, you can do this yourself online 3 x a year, but I always call Airbnb and get them to do it to ensure it is actually penalty free.

I've also turned off IB. I don't trust that the filters work. Airbnb doesn't actually explain what 'recommended by hosts' or 'guests with good ratings' actually means. IB guests also almost never answer the pre-booking questions. I have also had a guest whose ID wasn't verified (CS confirmed that they didn't verify it because the photos didn't match) IB with me even though I also had that filter switched on. She turned out to be an absolute nightmare and my craziest guest to date. That's not to say that she wouldn't have been awful if her ID was verified, but there was something dodgy going on with this girl and she should not have been able to IB with me in the first place.

[Michael5047]

@Menna6 

Can you send a screenshot of your ''Instant Booking'' criteria with the checklist so I can help you out? You might have not check the correct ones.