New strict cancellation policy update

Lizzie
Former Community Manager
Former Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

New strict cancellation policy update

Hello everyone,

 

The Airbnb team heard feedback from you and the host community about the upcoming change to our Strict cancellation policy. In order to address your concerns, we’re delaying the change until May 1, 2018.

 

Before the change goes into effect, we’ll share more about what we’re doing to address your concerns, particularly around protecting your listing details from being shared with guests who cancel. But for now, we’d like to clear up some confusion and help you better understand the new policy and how it will benefit the whole community:

 

Here’s how the new grace period policy will work—and some of the protections we have in place for hosts:

 

Limited-time refund within 48 hours after booking when the check-in date is at least 14 days away

Guests must cancel within 48 hours after booking and can only cancel if their check-in date is 14+ days away. This means that no matter how far out your guests book, they only have 48 hours from the time they book to cancel for free. We want to make sure that if guests change their mind, you have enough time to get another booking.

 

Three refunds per year per guest

To prevent abuse, guests are limited to three fully refunded cancellations a year.

 

No full refunds for overlapping bookings

To make sure guests are not making multiple bookings and then cancelling, any booking made by a guest when they already have an active booking for those dates will not be covered under our grace period policy.

 

Your hosting success is top of mind for us, and tests of this policy—including among hosts with strict cancellation policies in place—strongly suggest the change will result in increased bookings and successful stays. With this grace period, not only do guests book with more confidence, but they also have the ability to resolve booking mistakes without requiring your valuable time and intervention.

 

We value your feedback, and will follow up shortly with more insight into how your ideas are shaping this policy.

 

Thanks,

Lizzie

 

----------Update April 24th, 2018----------

 

Hello everyone,

 

Just to let you know there is now an update regarding protecting your listing details, as mentioned above. 

 

Here is the link to take a look: An update on the Strict Cancellation Policy

 

Thanks,

Lizzie


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1,325 Replies 1,325

@Lizzie good steps. I like the cap on how many they can do. 

Thank you so much Lizzie, this is much much better for us hosts!

I'm actually shocked that they can do even one single cancellation let alone 3 and get away with it!! 

I agree @Mary996!!! If you cancel twice and expect a refund for it, you should be blocked from the site. I hate flakey Guests.

Great suggestion!

Hello 

@Lizzie

Have you seen this suggestion from Laura-K-O … its brilliant!! A bit of unequivocal. We need more of it, subject to fair warning to Guests!

  

 

@Lizzie    I still don't understand why the freebie cancellation is not less than 24 hours – 12hours, 6hours even 2 hours would be fairer.  And why not have 'Strict' and 'Strict with grace period" then we can decide what suits us.   Hosts only get 24 hours to do anything before they are penalized.  Guests who cancel on me have cancelled within a few hours because I have alerted them to the description, which they had not read,  I refund.  With '48hour freebie' guests can still hold  a host's calendar hostage, and potentially lose bookings, it also encourages irresponsible guests and takes away a host's cntrol over their property.  btw:  Airbnb still need to address not sending out hosts information before the guests freebie cancellation has run out.  Please see Hosts Voice.

Extend 14 days to at least 30. 14 days puts you at a higher risk of having a place unbooked. Lose the 48 hour grace and make it 24. Again 48 hours makes it to high risk especially when just outside 14 days. 24 hours is more than reasonable. 48 hours locks up your listing for too long. 

 

Limiting guests to three free cancellations per year is too high. Limit it to one cancellation per year. As hosts we only get three cancellations before being downgraded, penalized, yet I do about 40 bookings per year. So I have to think long and hard before I cancel a booking. A guest who most likely books Airbnb maybe 2 to 5 times a year and gets up to 3 cancellation free cards per year, doesn't have nearly as much at stake for cancelling and would be much more likely to cancel.

Couldn’t agree with you more! The hosts should

be respected and appreciated just as much as guests. We are equal parts of the equation; without hosts there are no accommodations for guests 😉

Totally agree with Kimberly.


@Kimberly314 wrote:

Couldn’t agree with you more! The hosts should

be respected and appreciated just as much as guests. We are equal parts of the equation; without hosts there are no accommodations for guests 😉


 

Thank You so much

Agree with that.

Please be aware that this policy will put hosts under more pressure, 14 days should be 30 days and cancellations should be 24 hours same as most airline policies, the primary reason youre in business is because of the hosts

Hi Timothy, I agree entirely with you.  I feel we are penalised by AirBnB, for been cautious hosts and looking for good bookings.  I think cancellations for guests should work according to the % of good bookings they had.  Start from 1 cancellation per year and every 5 stays a guest can have an extra cancellation per year with max. cancellations to 3 per year. This is a good proposal for AirBnB to adopt I think.

I reallllyyyy need to cancel a reservation that is 5 months away. As a guest, can I be allowed a full refund although I booked a reservation with a strict cancellation policy? Above states:

 

Three refunds per year per guest

To prevent abuse, guests are limited to three fully refunded cancellations  a year.

@Kamila68 Since you were aware of strict cancelation policies and agreed to them - why did not you buy travel insurance with "cancel for any reason" rider? Do you think it is fair for the host to take the hit? Hosts are already abused enough by ABNB