Guest cancels at last minute, what can I do?

[Lilja3]

Hi everyone.

I just set up my place for booking, late afternoon yesterday. In the settings, I put "1 day notice" on bookings, in order to have some wiggle room for last minute details and just in general.

At 7pm last night I get a booking for today, with a note from the guest that they are arriving early in the morning, asking for an early check in. A little annoyed at airbnb, as I thought the 1 day notice would give me a 24hr window, but despite of that, I put all the wheels in motion last night (sunday night) to finish every last details so the place would be perfect.

Now, at 9:34 am today, monday morning, the guest cancels his booking! Without so much as even a word, an explanation or anything. So here I sit, having not only spent the whole last night preparing, but also having gone through hoops in order to ensure he could get an early check in. 

Is this just OK? Can I do anything about this? Firstly, I find this highly rude, secondly, now I will lose the money for the booking, as there's already a booking right after so getting new people in the space is barely an option.

What can I do?

[Marit-Anne0]

@Lilja3

Unless you changed your cancellation policy after this incident, you will get paid.

Cancellations

Moderate

Cancel up to 5 days before check in and get a full refund (minus service fees). Cancel within 5 days of your trip and the first night is non-refundable, but 50% of the cost for the remaining nights will be refunded. Service fees are refunded when cancellation happens before check in and within 48 hours of booking.

As for the 1 day notice, it used to be like you describe, but it seems that it has been changed lately, and also discussed on the forum. Unfortunately, I can no longer remember the details, but personally I changed to 2 days notice after that.

[Lilja3]

Thanks for your answer. Found out that I would get the first night paid, which is better than nothing, but has since changed my cancellation policy to moderate.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Lilja3

if your setting is 1 day in advance then you can get a booking at Saturday until midnight for Sunday.

[Lilja3]

Yeah, figured that out the hard way 😄 haha