Booking requests that contravene Gov Guidelines

[Peter2704]

Hi,

Is anybody receiving requests that obviously contravene the post July 4th guidelines?

I've had to reject a booking request from somebody who wanted to stay in July with people from 7 different households, so I've declined.

It seems Airbnb are not policing any of this, and it's down to us to enforce the guidelines, but will be penalised for doing so as our stats will be negatively affected by declining requests...

I'd be interested to hear what other hosts are experiencing?

Thanks

Pete

[Anonymous]

@Lawrene0   Interesting! Well, for what it's worth, I've never come anywhere near the 88% mark (way too many inappropriate requests) but the only consequence has been that the number onscreen shows up orange instead of black. Which is fine; orange is the new black. 

The fact that features and changes aren't rolled out to all regions at once does make it hard to give reliable advice, and I'd hate to mislead anyone here. But one way or other, no host should ever let their Dashboard intimidate them into accepting a booking that isn't compliant with their local laws or house rules. 

[Lawrene0]

That's true, @Anonymous . Local laws and house rules come first no matter what a target says. My advice is for those who don't mind being a little intimidated by an unpaused dashboard, but who will ultimately stand firm. : )

[Helen350]

@Luke279 

[Peter2704]

Thanks for all the input everybody. I agree completely on all the points raised, I have never been too concerned or intimidated by the stats, if it's an obvious party, I state I am umcomfortable, and I think Airbnb do actually review that. Or for instance if somebody says - "is it OK for another 4 people to stay" the answer is obviously no and I state insurance reasons.

I believe there shall be an influx of requests from people in the near future who want to meet friends and Airbnb will be used as a side step against Gov advice. I appreciate their are differing statutes in many geographies, so it's up to us to ensure the safety of our properties and our neighbours. If the guest requests something that would breach the rules, I don't feel honour bound to accept a reservation - it's been a tough year financially but I'm not risking having my house wrecked or having the police visit!

Thanks again, first time in the community and it's been great!

Pete

[Trevor243]

AirBnB is bad. They make up all sorts of rules and guidelines that (mis)lead hosts into breaking the law.

As a host, you are legally responsible for obeying the law, regardless of whatever AirBnB says. Part of the UK government guidance is that you must give proper information to guests - and yes, that means you should say guests from a maximum of 2 households can share.

You won't always know if the family of 6 that just booked are all one household or 3 households. If the tell you they are from 3 households and you allow it, you could be in trouble and so could they. If you gave the correct info and they don't tell you, you won't know, so unlikely you would be in trouble.

[Helen350]

So, as a homeshare host @Trevor243 - Do you think I should count myself as ONE household, & therefore only accept bookings from ONE more household? (I'm assuming so....)

[Trevor243]

I would say yes, at least for now.

You can always contact your local authority for advice. Every local authority is working on this and checking up on businesses - local Trading Standards and Environmental Health teams are visiting businesses - but they're working on a "be helpful" basis to give advice, help and support. Check your local authority website and your tourist board website - they are all publishing advice which gets updated frequently at the moment.

[Helen3]

Can you not add it into your house rules that a max of 2 households can share and they must confirm on booking that that is the case @Peter2704  

And if they don't you can message to chase?

[Peter2704]

I could, but most people ignore the house rules anyway, here's an example from today (for 9 guests from different households for late July)

"Hi Peter,

I understand it contravenes the current guidelines, but because of the date I was hoping you would be able to accept it on the premise that the restrictions will have been relaxed by then. If not, I was going to utilise the free cancellation for the booking.
With this in mind, is there any way you could accept the booking? Or reserve it for me to book once the guidelines have been relaxed?

Thanks,
Sam

Peter

Sam,

That wouldn't make sense for me to accept a booking that would likely be cancelled when I could have somebody book who would not be breaching the guidelines. For example my next guests are a family of four from the same household who are getting away from London for the weekend.

I'd effectively be shooting myself in the foot.

Hope that's understandable.

Kind Regards,
Peter"