Superhost - Instant Book

[Leon49]

Dear Community,

I'm new to the hosting community, and I'm really glad that our new listing is doing great so far! However, I have a question with regards to Superhost Status.

While I understand that it is a requirement to have 100% Commitment (amongst other things) to be a Superhost, I also noticed that when I want to turn off Instant Booking, it says:

"We have your back

If you’re ever uncomfortable with a reservation, before or during a trip, you can cancel penalty-free."

So, here's the question. Does it mean that if we have Instant Booking turned on, and received a booking, we can cancel it without penalizing our Commitment Rate? Or how does this actually works?

Also, does changing the dates of a confirmed reservation affects Commitment Rate as well?

Seeking some clarity from the kind community here please!

TIA!

[Linda108]

Look up host cancellation under the Help Center to get a complete answer, @Leon49, but in short, you will be able to cancel an Instant Booking reservation if you are not comfortable with the guest.  Be sure to set the IB criteria to require no negative reviews and you will not need to cancel.  Sometimes the system allows an IB reservation when the dates are blocked or the guest has intentions to break your rules because they have not read the listing completely.  In those cases, I contact Air BNB and ask them to cancel.  Hope this helps

[Leon49]

Thanks Linda for the super fast response! Thank you for directing me to the article - wasn't sure what keyword to search for it.

Another question now, when you say "Sometimes the system allows an IB reservation when the dates are blocked or the guest has intentions to break your rules because they have not read the listing completely.  In those cases, I contact Air BNB and ask them to cancel. " - Why do we still need to contact Airbnb to cancel since we have full control and penalty-free cancellation? OR are there certain criteria for cancelling reservations even if we have IB turned on? 

[Linda108]

If the cancellation is due to an Air BNB system error or a guest error, I do not want to be responsible for cancellations.  Ultimately  Air BNB is watching hosts that cancel "too much".

[Marzena4]

Hello @Leon49. Changing the dates doesn't affect your commitment rate, nor does agreeing to a guest's request to change them. 

When it comes to cancellations, I would be careful even if you have IB on - theoretically you can, but I have seen hosts' reports that they had to go to the CS to waive punishment.

[David126]

I use IB and have opted out of all the requirements, I have not been able to find any correlation with guest types.

I am on site, if I was not then I would be thinking differently.