Blocked dates due to cancelled reservation

[Jana68]

I am brand new to this so I had no idea what I was doing so I canceled reservation and did not realize that those dates  will be blocked off my calendar  as unavalable. Is there anything I can do to unblock those dates  and make them available for booking ?  Booking was requested  in  March and reservation was  for July.   

**[Title Updated]

[Robin4 · Accepted solution]

@Jana68

Jana that is a bit unfortunate for you but whatever we do in life there are rules that we must adhere to. You would not dream of taking an auto out on the road just having a guess at the road rules! Running an Airbnb is a business and it is up to you to understand what you are doing. What has happened to you we see here on a daily basis, someone new has cancelled a booking and now they think they are being unfairly treated by Airbnb.

The problem is Jana, it's the guest that is being unfairly treated! When a guest makes a booking they don't just book your listing in isolation, they make other plans around that booking and a host cancellation can cost them a lot of money. Hosts were cancelling confirmed bookings to chase a more lucrative booking and Airbnb had to make it un-attractive for a host to cancel a confirmed reservation. Here are the rules surrounding the penalties for a host cancellation....

Jana there are ways around having a hosting relocated or refunded but, it must be done through Airbnb, not just hitting the cancel reservation button. You can call Airbnb on +1-855-424-7262 / 1-855-4-AIRBNB (toll-free) and plead that you are new and did not understand, but in general, 'I did not realise' is not a good enough reason for Airbnb to waive the penalty.

On your listing page directly next to your profile photo is a box marked 'Help'! If there is anything you are not sure about go to this help box and type a topic in the search bar and the relevant rules and options surrounding that topic will be displayed.

Jana, letting a room out is not just about making a dollar on the side, you need to understand your responsibilities otherwise your hosting career will be a very short and unsuccessful one!

But as I said, give them a call, you never know theyu may just let you off the hook!

Cheers.....Rob

[Jana68]

Thanks for your response .  It was totally my fault. I did not realize that my "Instant book" was

-on- ?   I was taken by suprise.  It was my first week on AIRBNB as  the host:)  I figured out that it was  ok to cancel right way  since the guest had more then 4 months to find a new place.  

You did make lots of good points here .  I do understand that every  business has to follow rulles and procedures or  they wont be able to exist , but I was hopping that there was a " New host one week training rulle " lol

[Nora51]

Auto book should not be on for new users.  The default settings are totally guest friendly and not at all friendly to hosts.  The very first group that contacted me wanted to negotiate a 10 week deal at a great rate.  While I was writing back and forth with them, I had HUGE groups of party people auto booking for all the music festival dates at really low rates.  And POOF - they were just on my calendar!! Just like that!  And a lot of them didn't have verified ids or social medial profiles.  No reviews.  No nothing.  I thought I was pretty thorough in going through all the prompts in the set-up process.  I was deferring to airbnb and kind of taking their lead on the default settings.  Big mistake.  Flexible cancellation policy? No way.   Auto book?  Not right away - no way! No verified id's? Why in the world would I want to allow those folks to auto book?  

They need to be host friendly.  New hosts should have an on-ramp.  Nobody should be allowed to turn on auto book until they've had a few successful hosting experiences.  

[Frances34]

Nora is quite right about it not being fair to the host , because its not easy to get hold of Airbnb at the time of making the decidtion to cancel a booking, Yes I can understand that you should not cancel a booking any later than 48 hours and the reason is always in the corespondance between host and client. which Air bnb is free to read. The host is Airbnb's life line to earn their money ? right . and the rules say  if you use 'INSTANT BOOK' you will not be punished,  well I have been !! For me luckily it not about the money , its the principul (spelling bad ) each case should be better studied before blocking dates at the very least. I shall never be able to regard Air bnb as I used to.

Frances

[Jody79]

Hi Nora, I see that you are also from Chicago.  We had the exact same experience as you describe here, 3 parties in our first month, guests completely disregarding our No parties or events and no smoking rules, must be a Chicago thing 😞 .  We've since changed our minimun night stay to two nights, upped our nightly rate (ignore Airbnb's price recommendations) and are now requiring a photo and verified ID from all guests before they can book.  It's only been a couple of months since we've put these new measures in place, but so far no more parties.  We have had one instance where guests were smoking, in which we have since placed a 'no smoking' sign on the entrance door and will be placing more within the space.  We'll see how this work. 🙂

[Lizzie]

Hello @Jana68,

Lovely to meet you. 

Great to see @Robin4's fantastic responsed helped you here and can help you going forward. 🙂

I hope you don't mind, I have moved your question and response and made it into a new topic, as it will make it easier to find for other hosts looking for a similar answer in the future. 

I hope this is fine with you and good luck with hosting. As a new host you might like to take a look at this great thread, with tips for new hosts.

Thanks,

Lizzie

[Craig114]

I am an instant booking host and was under impression that there would be no penalties ............... 

i thought blocked days days was also NOT going to happen ............... is this the case?

how do I unblock the dates?

[Laura960]

Thank you for the reproach, however, The person who booked the dates, for some reason booked them as if there were two seperate events.  He asked me to fix it to be one date and one entry.  The airbnb system very conveniently allows us to cancel.  But no where does it state that you can't "fix" someone elses error.  Now I look foolish for trying to help the guest.  I need help to fix this not punishment.  So does anyone have a way to fix this the guy "wants the two dates, but want's the booking as one booking, not two seperate bookings.  I asked him to try to fix it online and he said it wouldn't work.  I can only guess that he was being reproached for his mistake too!!!! 

[David126]

I have not cancelled anybody but when I go to an existing booking and before I even cancel there is text that says continue to select a reason and review the penalties.

[Lucie80]

Im in the same boat here too! Im new to this and had no idea my automatic booking was on  and before I knew it somebody had made an automatic booking. I cancelled it within 1 hr and explained what had happened. Did you ever get this resolved? Id really like to air bnb my apartment for 2 nights that weekend but cant. Any help and advice appreciated.

Lucie

[David126]

@Lucie80

Only thing you can do is contact ABBand plead ignorance. And read everything you can on how the system works.

[Pauline74]

I find it intersting that ABB has not solved this issue yet.  Nor responded to the rest of the folks here.  

Punishing hosts for AirBnBs glitchy system is not right.  

Ignoring hosts is even worse. 

[Ncane0]

Must be on auto boook too.  Just started where do I cancel auto book. Thanks

[Nicholas361]

I had a similar issue because a 'smart' pricing issue whereby it offered my listing at a 40%+ discount which was not in line with the weekly or daily smart pricing or limits. It also auto-approved this guest who I did not preauthorize or approve.

I canceled the reservation to avoid paying (essentially not losing money) on a reservation and now it's blocked for an entire month.

That seems unreasonable considering the guest seems to understand that there was a pricing error of some kind. I don't  know why this platform would have such inflexible rules with regards to that situation.