New strict cancellation policy update

[Lizzie]

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

[Chris959]

Hey Jung, I think your are spot on with your understanding and conclusions> I too am giving priority to other platforms; I waited a year to give AirBnb time to see their mistake and followed up by requesting a more strict cancelation  option and was turned down. Basically they are encouraging people to book on a whim knowing that they can cancel theeir booking for no reason at all....a very one sided policy indeed

[Mohamad-Firdaus0]

I'm sorry it won't do any good. As long as the Extenuating Circumstances Policy still exist, it doesn't matter what type of cancelation policy you choose because Airbnb can overide them anytime without even investigate and/ or check thorughly on the claims and documentation provided by the guest. 

Yesterday, I just received a cancellation from a guest who had made a long term stay reservation (16 Jan - 8 March 2019) since October 2018. The reason given was that the oldest brother was dignosed 3 days ago with liver cancer. But the problem is the that oldest brother is not a travelling party as the guest told me that she is coming with her husband. According to the clause in  Extenuating Policy, circumstances that require documentation are, --> "serious illness of a host, guest, or any member of the traveling party. You’ll be asked to provide a general statement from a physician confirming that the person can't travel. The statement must be dated after the reservation was booked". In my case, obviously the guest didn't not fullfill this. But they still told me this, --> "according to the extenuating circumstances' policy, I have to issue a full refund to the guest. I just wanted to inform you, there will no payout sent for this reservation. I hope you can understand". Can you expect me to understand something that is even against your own policy? 

One best part, I also talked to another airbnb support staff. This one told me that there is a designated team who thoroughly validates the documents being submitted by guest. We do not provide refund right away after they claim for an Extenuating Circumstance. We also do not provide refunds right away too if they sent documents as it is being submitted to a team who validates the authenticity of the documents provided." But from what i'm getting, it seems like they just made the decision to give full refund straight away after getting the documents without even checking the authencity of the documents. Get it? Yesterday, the guest cancelled the reservation, today she gave the documentation, and Airbnb straight away sent me an email saying i'm not getting anything from it.

It is true that Airbnb have unblocked those dates yesterday but the damage is already being done. If that guest had not made such a long term reservation, i would have been able to receive many bookings. Right now, i'm suffering losses from a prospect reservation especially  we are in a peak season. As you all know, people don't make bookings last minute, they often make bookings months before their arrival date.

I believe this is a loophole that guests will use in order to get full refund despite what ever cancellation policy used by hosts. I also believe that this Airbnb Extenuating Circumstance Policy will be abused by guests and as a result of that many hosts will suffer current and future earning loses.

It's obvious that Airbnb definately valued guests far better than hosts. But they forgot that we are the one who shaped the world of Airbnb. This is only one case that happen to me so far but i'm sure they are many hosts that have suffered the same thing. Our complaints will always fall into deaf ears as long as the Airbnb Extenuating Circumstance Policy exist!

[Martha216]

@Mohamad2

I'm so upset to hear this happened to you, especially on such a long term booking!

I had a booking last fall where I received a phone call the day before check-in stating that she had booked the apartment for her parents to visit but then her father was too ill to travel. 

She asked what she should do and I explained how to cancel the reservation.  Then I stated that I would refund 50% back to her out of respect for the situation with her father being ill. 

After she cancelled, she saw Airbnb's prompt to provide documentation and sure enough, Airbnb suddenly sent me a message stating that there would be no payout because the guest provided supporting documentation of their extenuating circumstances. 

There was absolutely not enough time for the Airbnb staff to have checked the authenticity of the documentation!  It's likely that we are not the only Hosts who have experienced this.  

[Isabella216]

I Need to know why I changed the prices on my calendar and if you visit my site you have other charges......Let me ,please, what I can do. Best regards

[Chris959]

Isabella, you need to contact AirBnB. They do not offer any help from here you most ask AirBnB through Host Help or ask by asking a seperate question from other hosts. This is specific topic about the New Cancellation Policy. Good luck.

[Eve46]

I have a seasonal rental which has always had no cancelations.  Just learning about the cancelation two weeks out with no penalty.  That will not work for me.

would like to stay in Airbnb, however, a two weeks cancelation policy can blow my summer.  For large houses, groups plan well in advance.

please let me know if a super strict policy is forth coming.  If not I am going to have to take off my listing.  Eve

[Rhonda143]

Same! I already block my summer months from AirBNB customers - last minute cancelations will not work for me. We have a lot more choices to work with.

[Peta7]

ANALYSIS OF HOST VS PLATFORM OWNERS / GUEST CONTEST AS RECENTLY ANNOUNCED BY AIRBNB'S VERY OWN IDI AMIN:

First in favor of the guest:

NEW AIRBNB REVIEW POLICY:

Then again in favor of the guest:

NEW AIRBNB CANCELLATION POLICY:

and now another in favor of the guest:

NEW AIRBNB PROFILE PHOTO POLICY:

And in favor of the host we have:

PROMISED REVISED REVIEW GUIDELINES NOT IMPLEMENTED TO DATE.

Although we realize like most others that our plea for sanity will fall on deaf ears the following is our penny’s worth:

First of all; we believe any major platform shift without consulting all platform users to be an unfair business practice and believe that especially in modern times such practice should be buried along with dictatorship, despotism, autocracy, authoritarianism and tyranny despised so much in our times.

An old saying in contention to unnecessary transformation alleges that “Nothing succeeds like success” Hopefully the highly esteemed Airbnb team are not pursuing competitor platform policies for the sake of evolution.

We have just removed our listings from such a competitor platform operating without profile photos nor any recourse after cancellation even with a strict cancellation policy in place and with no importance attached to reviews at all.

The foremost reason for removal was to distance ourselves from such platforms believed to be used mainly for Visa acquiring purposes and possibly by Drug lords and Human trafficking syndicates.

Personal experience taught that less than 15% of the immense number of bookings received from such platforms materialize with the remaining more than 75 % being unresponsive and end up as ‘no shows’ thereby leaving the platform calendars blocked for long periods even although no intention of a stay ever existed, this practice is obviously considered much worse than ‘cancellation with ill motive’ and makes cross platform calendar syncing completely impracticable.

Another concern is that management is taking the ‘Airbnb Hell’ site too seriously with blogs mainly from ignorant disgruntled users unable to get a refund from a listing with a strict cancelation clause in place; as this will surely be considered a text book case of “the blind leading the blind”?

Therefor this plea to senior management to again revert back to the old Airbnb once considered by many users as the booking platform of choice being miles ahead of all competitors and to again pursue the feeling of ALL platform users belonging and to remove the new blatant animosity existing between guests and hosts caused by extremely unfair and unnecessary platform policy shifts without prior consultation.

Therefor this plea to senior management to again revert back to the old Airbnb once considered by most users as the booking platform of choice being miles ahead of all competitors and to once again pursue a feeling of all platform users belonging and to remove the new blatant animosity now existing between guests, hosts and platform owners alike caused by the believed to be extremely unfair and unnecessary platform policy shifts without prior consultation. 

[Nancy458]

Thank you, Peta.  I agree with 100%.

I believe we need to view Airbnb like a listing service. If profile photos are removed, then I will not allow those guests to stay. There is always that setting, "guests must have host approval before booking."

Maybe that is where this is headed?

[Piroska5]

If guests want to have full flexibility, to cancel, to arrive, to pay, to get details of the property, then the should go to a Hotel. We cannot manage an apartment like a Hotel. 

When a guest choose and reserve an apartment, in general they know what they want. Usually they have fligth tickets which are not refundable, so why shoud we refund? I have had this case several times...If they are not sure about the date, then they should wait and book later. Do you really think that 14 days are enough to get a new booking?

So, for me, strick cancellation should be that, strick. The host that choose strick cancellation assume the risk of getting less bookings, and the guest has the choice. But if any concession: 

- limited-time refund within 24 hours after booking, and of course, the calendar would be blocked only those 24hours

- and can only cancel if the check-in date is at least 3 months away after booking. 

Thanks.

[Chris959]

I completely agree with everything you say. Strict cancellation used to be 2 weeks, but I think you will find it is only 1 week these days, which is a joke!

[JD31]

48 hours to cancel seems appropriate .  Typical US state contract law allows a 3 day grace period to get out of a contract.  

I am evaluating using Airbnb for managing the advertising of my beach rental house.  It is a deal killer for me that a renter can cancel 14 days before the rental period and get a 100% refund.  I have been renting houses for almost 30 years and I always require a deposit which is not refundable so that there is a commitment from the renter.  Two weeks is not enough time for me to scramble to replace their booking.  I'd be OK with the 30 day 'super strict' option, but am told that isn't available to me .  In the past I have allowed renters to cancel and get a refund if we can get the house re-rented. The competing rental sites (e.g. VRBO) have options for 30 & 60 day periods, or a no refund policy.    If Airbnb would like to win over the exodus of homeonwers from Home Away they should change their policy.  Just curious if I am in the minority.   

[Justin-And-Anna0]

No, you are not in the minority.  Since implementing this measure, we have turned off instant book, raised our Airbnb rates, and regularly don't update our Airbnb calendar.  When folks email us asking for approval during peak season, we tell them that we don't take any Airbnb bookings during peak season because we cannot depend on the short cancelation window.  No one has Googled us and re-booked on another platform, but I am sure that is coming.

The best way to send a message to a business is to stop sending them business.  We went from 80% Airbnb to now about 10%

[Lou47]

Because of this change, I have limited Airbnb most of the year. I now only open up the calendar to Airbnb to a period in time that this new policy wont affect (ie., I only use Airbnb for last minute bookings). Too bad, but the other sites are working out for me better in many ways.

[Ann10]

Hi Lou,

Which other sites do you use?