Cancellation policy

[Ieva4]

Hello!

A guest of mine sent me a cancellation, which I had to approve (by clicking "cancel" or "keep reservation"), I had the strict policy, but the guest wanted full refund.

Do I have to pay cancellation fee 50$ ?

Thank you in advance!

[Hilary-And-Ed0]

If you approved a cancellation, you will be penalized in a variety of ways.  Sometimes the $50 fee kicks in.  Always, you will have those dates blocked for future bookings, and also you will be ineligible to be superhost for one year from the cancellation.

It is tricky (and in my opinion unfair due to misleading wording), but if the guest wants to cancel, you do not need to approve anything.  They can cancel independently on their own, and then you will not be penalized in the future.  Next time a guest wants to cancel, just send them a message to do it on their own.

Regarding your strict cancellation policy, the guest knew that at booking time. You do not need to refund the other 50% of the money.

[Helen3]

Hello @Ieva4

It sounds like you have been caught out by Airbnb's badly worded message. The guest lied and told Airbnb you wanted to cancel the booking and you confirmed this by telling Airbnb you wanted to cancel.

I would suggest you call Airbnb now and explain what happened. They will be able to see in the messaging system that the guest wanted to cancel.

They should organise for it to be a guest cancellation and your strict cancellation to stay in place (but they might just side to cancel it themselves).

Have a look at Airbnb Help Centre under host cancellations to understand how things work if a host cancels a booking.