Instant Book feature technical glitch

Answered!
Craig178
Level 7
Maryland, United States

Instant Book feature technical glitch

Hi,

 

It has been since October 31st that my listing does not show up in serch at all when the guests filter area listings by selecting the "Instant Book" filter. If the "Instant Book" filter is turned off, my listing shows up right away on top of the list with a message "Rare find, usually booked". The "Instant Book" feature is "turned on" on my booking. Guests should be able to use Instant Book to book my listing, but for the last three weeks they have been sending me requests to book.

 

Thanks

Craig

1 Best Answer
Lawrene0
Level 10
Florence, Canada

A couple of things, @Craig178. The first is that you have a ton of reviews, but only as a host. I don't see any reviews of you as a guest. So you may not qualify to see your own listing as Instant Book, because you would not host yourself, so to speak. And those people sending requests may not qualify either. Do you require guests to have previous reviews and government ID? That would explain why they (and you) cannot Instant Book.

See if it is that. If not, there are a couple of other theories out there right now. One is that when too many guests use the cancel-within-48-hours offer, the host is penalized. That one is ridiculous if it is real, and hopefully gets fixed soon. 

View Best Answer in original post

37 Replies 37
Helen427
Level 10
Auckland, New Zealand

Hello @Danny210 

 Did you get these issues sorted out?

Are you still using ABB?

 

 If you get notification of this message make sure you pop  in here and have your say re Enhanced cleaning & mask wearing in New Zealand  - use keywords in the searchbox & they will pop up.

 

All the best from a nice Sunny Auckland, New Zealand 

Craig178
Level 7
Maryland, United States

That is absolutely horrible! Danny. I am in the same situation - Airbnb ignores my requests for clarification of why I do not  have an Instant Book feature in my listing. I also received a requests to book, which Airbnb cancelled later - guest was unable to pay and another request for a year long booking of my house, which I am unable to do, as stated in my listing. 

I can only assume that though, it is no fault of mine, Airbnb treats it as a cancellation and penalizes me.

 

i have been without Instant Book since October 31st and lost all the bookings I used to have.

 

i wish Airbnb could be honest with me and explain what is going on...

 

Other hosts recommend to use Facebook and Twitter to reach out to Airbnb and ask for the solution to this unfair and horrible penalty 

Danny210
Level 2
New Zealand

Yeah, I've spoken to them on Facebook but the scripted corporate response forcefield is just as strong!!! *%$#*

Tania90
Level 2
Northland, New Zealand

I am experiencing a total nightmare with AIRBNB over this too.

I have had my listings on Instant Book since being with them.

NO cancellation penalty.

however I had a cancellation due to a double booking, my fault.

so the next booking came thru as Request to Book, stating ‘AIRBNB sometimes request guests to request to book after a recent cancellation, or a calendar needs updating’

ok , fair enough, but AIRBNB are STILL overriding my instant book, all have to request to book. It is crippling my business.

I have spent untold hours  on conversations, messages, supervisors(who by the way had never even seen the notification that came with the booking) !!! What !!screenshot sent.

how can it be resolved if supervisors don’t even understand the system.

if they can impose an override, they can lift it, but nobody has, can, or will.

I need this income, I’m sure no staff member at AIRBNB would accept if they came to work one day to be told ‘sorry no wages until further notice, because there is a glitch in the system.and we don’t know when it will be fixed, sorry for the inconvenience.’

I have sent an email to Brian Chesky , I wonder if that will disappear into the black hole that is AIRBNB incompetency.

I realise I am a mere minnow in the system, but there wouldn’t be a system without the hosts.

 

Craig178
Level 7
Maryland, United States

Tanya, that is horrible. I am sorry to hear that you are going through the same nightmare. I had not bookings the 1st week of December, which is unspeakable. I lost a lot of money in potential bookings and wasted a lot of time messaging and calling Airbnb. They all pretend that they have no clue what I am talking about.

Airbnb keeps telling me that when they search for my listing, it shows in the search. But when I ask Airbnb to use the Instant Book filter and to try my listing, all of a sudden they have nothing to say.

 

My personal belief is that the hosts who contacted Airbnb and asked to cancel the reservation on their behalf, were flagged by the Airbnb system and their Instant Book feature was deactivated. I have difficulty believing that no one from Airbnb's technical team knows how to resolve this issue. I believe that this is something new that Airbnb is doing trying to discourage hosts from calling and asking Airbnb to cancell penatly free. This is their way to make sure that hosts do not even dare to call Airbnb and request a penalty free cancellation. Unfortunately, it is all about making money for them. They will punish a dozens or hundreds hosts like us, to make sure that we and others learn a lesson to never ever request to cancel reservation penalty free.

 

Today, I spoke with Airbnb and got the same answer that my request will be forwarded to somebody else. No time-frame was given to me when the Instant Book feature is going to be activated on my account.

 

I even sent them a message inquiring about the steps I have to take (what I need to improve) to get out of this penalty box I was put in when I requested penalty free cancellation. I was told that I am in good standing, have zero cancellations and that I am doing a fantastic job.

 

Yes, I am doing a fantastic job, but I am and others' are penalized for trying to following the rules set by Airbnb (to cancel penalty free).

 

I see the only solution to this issue to either address this issue daily through messages and phone calls (someone has to give up) or to look for another booking platform. It is very sad that it has to be this ways.

Hi Craig , I have this same problem almost 2 weeks , 

can you please give me some idea how you solve it at the end ?

it really make me worst ,

i has contact Airbnb support team 

thousand of times but no one can help me 

 

Helen427
Level 10
Auckland, New Zealand

Hello @Tania90  in Northland , New Zealand from a fellow host in Remuera, Auckland, have a read of my reply to @Danny210 & remember to have your say about the proposed 20 November 2020 protocols...

 

See you in here soon

 

Central To All Home & Location, Remuera, Auckland, New Zealand 

Danny210
Level 2
New Zealand

I'm on the verge of deleting my account, accepting the loss of 'Superhoast' and references etc and just starting again with a new acount.

this wil not help, I alreadt try it

Irina240
Level 2
Haifa District, IL

Hi , Iam in the same situation. Before 10 days I get answer from AirBnb: 

 

Answer from AirBnb:

I have submitted your issue to our product specialist. Our engineers are monitoring your account but expect the request to book to still occur within 7 days. 

You will be notified once the Instant book option has been addressed. Our product specialists are optimizing our system for improvements"
 
After 10 days nothing happend. 
-------------------------------------
Today 29 januar 2019 I talk to Airbnb support
their answer: 
"Your account is considered as high risk in cancelling a reservation so for us to help you out, the system will automatically set your setting into request to book for you to avoid any sudden cancellation.

And as bookings are successfully completed, hosts will be automatically assessed and their listings will be returned to Instant Book. This assessment is completed every 7 days.
 
I know that you are upset, the previous representative had helped you to cancel the reservation without any penalties.

Having the setting of your account under request to book is one for us to help you to avoid cancellation, you have nothing to worry about as your account will be assessed again and automatically be back to instant book.""
 
OK now I will wait. 
 
 
 
 
Eric1094
Level 1
Philadelphia, PA

My instant book was also turned off without my being notified.  It appears to be on but doesnt appear in instant book searches.  I messaged and spoke to two customer service reps and they gave me the same explanation.   That instant book is disabled when i deny a request to book with a message from the guest that i need to decline for obvious reasons like the person wants to bring too many extra people or stay for months when we only allow one month.  And instant book is only turned back on when i have another successful guest stay.   They gave me no advice on what to do to prevent this from happening over and over again.  Do i not respond with an accept or decline to these guest requests we cant accommodate?   I ALWAYS accept instant bookings because they always meet our guest criteria!   So it makes no sense to turn off instant book because i deny other requests from guests that clearly dont comply with our guest requirements like # of guests or length of stay.   Im so frustrated!  Any advice on what to do to keep instant booking on would be appreciated!

Jennifer1421
Level 10
Peterborough, Canada

@Craig178 @Susie98 @Irina240 et al:

 

I'm trying to formulate a theory about why this is happening. If you have the time, please respond to this thread with your circumstances:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Host-Circle/Instant-Book-Cancelled-Theory-and-Research/m-p/95007...

Thanks!

Eric1177
Level 2
Los Angeles, CA

Just wanted to add more evidence to this.

 

I have this EXACT same issue. I cancelled an instant book because I was uncomfortable with the booking, and it says in the instant booking policy that if you cancel for that reason you won't get penalized. I didn't get any cancellation strikes on my account nor did I get fined BUT they turned off my Instant Booking behind the scenes..... 😞 even though I have it turned on in my hosting dashboad, nobody has been able to instant book my place for the past 2 weeks and I can't find my listing with the instant booking filter on.

 

I just hate how it looks like it's on, but in reality it's off.... It causes so much confusion and I haven't been able to get any customer service reps to even understand the issue!!! 😞 much less help me.

Andrew592
Level 2
Toronto, Canada

Just curious any updates? I had to cancel one because of bad reviews from previous hosts (lots of smoking) And another guest request a refund due to their kid not having a passport. 

 

Do I just need to keep up calling airbnb? Any call center hacks to get them to open a ticket? 

Ricardo642
Level 2
Lisbon, Portugal

Hi same thing happen to me. had to cancel reservations due to a water pipe rupture with "no penalties".

Suddenly ZERO instant bookings, all I get is booking requests. When i go to "listings" the instant booking in ON, so I'm sure Airbnb is doing this because I don't have any guests requirements set. At least now I know why thanks to this forum because airbnb gave me only vague answers.