Booking Window not working?

[Paul172]

Hi everyone,

I've set my booking window to 3 months, which I thought would mean people couldn't book beyond that. However I've just received a booking for February, which is in 7 months time! And even worse, the price at which it's been booked is lower than the smart pricing rate.

Any suggestions? Do I still need to go and block out these future dates and then unblock them?

Thanks,

Paul

[Evelyn0]

I will double check your settings sometimes things get wonky. Let the guest know that you don't book so far in advance. 

[Jarad0]

I've had the same issue.  I only want to set the booking window to three months in advance.  With smart pricing on it lists dates available until the end of time and I've had to decline requests because of the error.  I've checked my settting and spoken with someone at customer service and after not understanding the issue after several attempts.  They finally got it and said they would ask a programmer about it.  No response, ever.  

[David262]

You have to appreciate the order of operation that Airbnb applies to calendar manipulation. 

So, consider the following example alterations that your might make to your availability: 

a) make the 25th of next month unavailable (as I have something on),

b) set a specific available price on the first Tuesday in 5 months to $500 (as this is a popular date, which guests in your region like to book in advance),

c) make dates in the next 3 months available, and exclude those beyond.

If the query was carried out in that order (a, then b, then c), the final command (c - to make dates available in the next 3 months) would over-ride the blocking of the 25th for next month. In effect stopping you from ever being able make dates in your calendar unavailable!

And, it would also stop the first Tuesday in 5 months from displaying (as that is beyond the 3 month limit), even though you want to specifically advertise that now (and had manually set it to available). 

So, in my experience, Airbnb runs the over-rides to the database in the opposite direction, that is c, b and a.

First of all it sets the dates for the next 3 months as available, and new dates beyond that to unavailable (c)

Then it sets the price for the first Tuesday in 5 months time as available (as you had manually set this date to available), so it will display on your calendar to enable booking (over-riding the 3 month limit)

Finally it makes the 25th of next month unavailable (over-riding the 3 month available setting), ensuring any bespoke future pricing/availability over-rides the more general monthly availability settings.

(Of course, it also does other things to your calendar, including blocking out dates where you already have bookings...etc)

So sometimes, knowing the order in which Airbnb applies bespoke conditions to the calendar, helps you to understand how the outcome will be displayed. I don't use auto-pricing, but my guess is that its position in the order of operation, is more important than a 3 month block! (So auto-price settings, will over-ride any advanced calendar availability settings?)

A similar analogy would be in maths. e.g. what is 3+4x5 = ? ...if you think 35, then you would be incorrect as the mathematical order of operation makes multiplication more important than addition, so the answer is 23! (i.e 4x5 = 20 then +3 = 23)

[Jarad0]

I appreciate your reply.  Once again the airbnb community is great at pointing out the issues of airbnb, but will it ever be corrected? Probably not.  

A few notes: 

1) I'm not considering airbnb's order of operation, because this isn't information airbnb readily posts anywhere, nor should it.  I'm simply selecting an option on airbnb's listing service and it isn't working.  If it doesn't work through smart pricing, then airbnb should remove the booking window entirely when smart pricing is selected.  Most users do not posess the level of sophistication you've outlined below.   I understand the order of operation in mathematics and even if I didn't I could go somewhere to look the order of operation up or learn about it.  With airbnb you have to guess and ask questions to a community as opposed to get answers from a customer service operation that actually knows the answers.  A terrible way to do business and what's worse is I end up looking bad because a guest thinks that I made a mistake in pricing.  

2) The way you're trying to manipulate the calendar is cumbersome and relies on constantly monitoring and remonitoring the specific airbnb calendar.  I use a property management system that updates availability to several different listing sites and adding this additional step is just another reason airbnb is a lesser service.   

3) This is a huge company that should have these issues figured out and having to discuss this endlessly in a discussion forum is even more frustrating.  I have no love for airbnb in comparison to it's peers and get less than 5% of my business from them.  I feel they make the entire process as cumbersome as possible and could make very simple corrections to alleviate this.  

I appreciate your answer, but it's more of a bandaid than any kind of answer or fix.  

Thanks,

Jarad

[Liam28]

I agree Jared! Spot On 🙂

Out of curiosity which alternative companies do you use for most bookings? 

I've been pretty dissapointed with their service thus far.

Regards

Liam

[Jarad0]

VRBO and Tripadvisor, but I"m more vacation rentals.  Airbnb seems to cater to more downtown areas that compete with nightly hotels.  Both of them have their issues, but not like airbnb. 

It's frustrating to wait on hold with customer service for a long time only to be told that they can't help you and aren't sure if anyone can...

[Tasha12]

This has also happened to me.  I have clearly marked the setting to 3 months in advance.  I've even deselected it and then reselected it to reset the option.  I just got a booking for November which is also 7 months in advance.  I've been on hold trying to reach a live person for nearly an HOUR now.  ALso, my airbnb calendar used to sync with my iphone calendar.  But now, its totally random which reservations show up in my ical and which ones get left off.  Its SO FRUSTRATING.

C'mon Airbnb.  Pick up the phone!!!

[Theresa-and-Martin0]

We have just had this happen too.

It was set for 3 months. However, somebody has just instant booked 6 months ahead. 

From what I see on the forums it is not worth even contacting support as there is no fix. Very poor. 

Frustrating. The property may be sold next year and that is why we were limiting the booking window. Starting to lose faith in the AirBnB system 😞

[Ashlee13]

I had the same problem.  Check out the answer at the bottom of this thread:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/booking-window/td-p/270373

Where Shelly says "I think I found the solution to the Booking window delimma. Go to your calendar, select a couple of months worth of days that are just beyond 6 months out (or whatever booking window you have selected). The pop up box will show and your choices are Available, Blocked or Unavailable Until such and such Date Based upon your 6 month Booking Window. Select the Unavailable option. The dates will no longer show a $, nor will they have a line trough them (ie blocked).  If you select a block of days inside you booking window, you will not get this Unavailable option. Good luck!!"

You will see availabiity options for each date past your booking window of:

1 - Available

2 - Blocked

3 - Unavailable until [DATE] Based on your X-month booking window.

Select option 3 to get back to using your normal automatic window of availability for whatever future dates you want to obey the window policy you've set.

[-Email-Hidden-By-Airbnb-9]

When I try to block dates that are not available by selecting dates on my calendar, I get this: You can manage your calendar and pricing settings through your property management system. BUT WHERE IS THAT? Everywhere where i read, it says do it via calendar...

[-Email-Hidden-By-Airbnb-9]

[-Email-Hidden-By-Airbnb-9]

And most of my edit buttons are greyed out.