Improve the Accept/Decline Process - Don't penalize the hosts because the guests don't read

[Cristen2]

Many times I've had to decline a reservation request because the guest wants something that is against my house rules/policy.  Yes, I agree sometimes asking or explaining a situation may get a host to change their mind (ie. a reservation request with kids when the listing says no kids) but not always.  Either way in this case if I don't want to make the exception I'm penalized.  If I just don't accept or decline then I'm dinging for not responding within 24 hours since responding via chat doesn't not count as responding or I'm dinged for declining a request if I hit the decline button.  When I called the SuperHost line about this previously their response was to ask the guest to withdraw their request...that doesn't seem helpful either.

Additionally, since I require the potential guests to provide some information about them and their trip before I accept the reservation (I rent a room in my home I have to screen carefully) if the guest doesn't respond to my message/question in a timely manner I'm forced to either accept a reservation I'm not comfortable with yet or decline it and then get dinged.

Yes, hosts need to be held to standards but don't make it so difficult to adhere to those standards because without good hosts and properties you aren't going to have guests either.

[Tami-And-Dave0]

Amen to this one!  In the very least, we shouldn’t be penalized when the guest makes a request for more guests than the home can accommodate or states they want to use the property to throw a party when the information clearly states no parties allowed. 

[Mark712]

Agree - often you get a booking with a message that says can I actually have one night instead of two or offer a ridiculous price. Airbnb tends to assume you’re being difficult when you politely decline. Presumption is wrong.

[Jenny-and-Claes0]

Please post proof from AirBnB that asking a guest questions does NOT qualify as responding to a guest within 24 hours?

I  am not aware that I MUST choose either Pre-Approve or Decline within 24 hours to count as a proper response!?

[Cristen2]

Jenny & Claes - That was what AirBnB told me over the phone when I called the SuperHost line a few months back to ask.  I had a request that I was a bit unsure about and was waiting on the guest to respond to my chat message with some questions and we were nearing the end of the 24 hour period.  They said the 24 hour response period tracking system only tracked when you clicked one of those options not simply responding via message. I unfortunately don't have that in writing and if perhaps policy has changed then that's great.

[Guillem2]

I totally agree. I often am in the midst of correspondence back and forth with a potential guest but face a black mark if this exchange is not completed within 24 hours. This is STUPID. It forces Hosts to accept Guests prior to the Guest having all the answered requested and forces the Host into a possibly bad Guest.

[Retha-and-Karolina--Baza0]

Jenny & Claes - yes, you have to either pre-approve or decline the request not to be penalized.

[Laura-And-Mike0]

Exactly!  I have a very, very long detailed listing that clearly states:  NO dishwasher.  Guest arrived an was shocked there was no dishwasher.  So now when someone books I send a message of thanks AND please read the ENTIRE listing details and look at the 50+ up to date photo's.

[Jenny-and-Claes0]

I called AirBnB today twice with Jules and Mark and they sent me https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/430/what-is-response-rate-and-how-is-it-calculated which explains that simply "Reply to new messages from guests" does qualify as a response and I will NOT get dinged for not responding even if I don't "Pre-approve" or "Decline" the guest within 24 hours. This is usually what we have always done when we get asked questions about our accommodations and people sometimes don't answer back since they realize they don't want to pay the extra price we charge for a meeting/party, etc. or we simply don't fit what they are looking for. We have a 100% response rate and Mark confirmed several different guests that still show up as "Inquiry" or "Not possible" in our Inbox since we simply had a correspondence with them and they never booked.

But the memo should make above method more clear by saying "do ONE OF the following within 24 hours"!

Mark also confirmed that you can get dinged in your search rankings for choosing "Decline" 5 consecutive times/too often so just responding to the inquiry without choosing either "Pre-approve" or "Decline" seems like the best way to respond if you don't get an answer at all or a satisfactory answer to any questions you have.

I also asked AirBnB to clarify the above memo to say that you can also respond by choosing "Send Special Offer" since Mark confirmed that this qualifies as a response and we also confirmed it ourselves since the  "Pre-Approve" or "Decline" options disappeared after we sent a Special Offer. E.g., we might send a Special Offer (usually at a higher rate than we might actually charge for a party, etc. if we have adequate answers) just to entice the guest to book.  We will then also send a message to the guest explaining that we might be able to lower the Special Offer price if we get satisfactory answers about how many party guests, arrangements they expect, etc..

[Cristen2]

Thanks sharing That! I'm also going to call because I've gotten notifications from AirBnB reminding that it's close to the 24 hour mark and need to respond even when I've sent a message.

[Šarka0]

Reading the article about Response rate @Jenny-and-Claes0 posted, to me it still does not fix the Accept/Decline/Pre-approve situation.

When getting an inquiry the 24h countdown starts, urging you to Accept or Decline or Pre-approve. Even if you respond in a message, you still need to push one of those buttons, and if you don't you can get penalized (my opinion).

I think the "Improving response rate" with Accepting, Declining, Pre-approving AND sending a message only works for, well, improving the response rate on your dashboard, and not actually helping you not get penalized if you don't click one of the buttons in the 24h period, because you are waiting for a reply from your guests regarding their stay.

<RANT ON> Now a little bit more ranting about the accept/decline and also about the infant policy 🙂

I had an inquiry where guests wanted to bring their infant and in our house rules it states that it is not suitable for infants, but we can make an exception as long as guests are warned about it and that they agree with it. Also I had a little bit of a problem with Airbnb's new policy about infants not counting as guests... However, I did warn the guest that we still charge a nightly rate for infants and that I'll accept the equiry and change the quote once they agree to our terms. During that time, I responded within 10 minutes of the inquiry with the message, the countdown to Accept or Decline was still going on and I was seeing the warning in my inbox (so nope, I don't think responding with messages counts as "the response" in this case).

What is more, I could not send a special offer (where I could charge them extra for the infant) BEFORE actually accepting the booking! There was no button. So after I got the agreement of my terms from the guest, I accepted and right after I modified the reservation to an extra guest and sent them an offer to accept it. Right after that I got a message from the guest that they don't know why I'm charging them extra when it states on the AirBnb site that infants don't count as guests and should not be charged. This could be a real problem then if the guest didn't want to accept the extra charge (luckily they did, because I wrote that I warned them previously about the extra charge, I wouldn't be accepting their request if they didn't agree, and that in the Airbnb policy it also states we can still charge extra for the infants, and that we still consider infants as persons even if Airbnb doesn't... there is still the same amount of work to be done for the infants as for the older guests - plus you actually need to have a cot and baby-proof the place). <RANT OFF>

What I want to be thankful for at that time is that I didn't have the 48h grace period on in my Strict cancellation policy or else I could loose a booking 🙂 So consider turning off the grace period in Strict policy!