calendar synching problem

calendar synching problem

I am in Melbourne, Australia and all of a sudden my Booking.com calendar is not recognised in Airbnb.

When I go to refresh, it states Booking.com but nothing actually appears in the claendar itself.

Then I tried to import again and it doesn't work.

I am getting double bookings that aren't my fault!

Any ideas?

Cheers,

Karla

16 Replies 16
Marlous0
Level 2
Melbourne, Australia

Hi Karla, I had exactly the same problem - I had a Booking.com booking for Easter and all of sudden it wasn't there - in fact I noticed it this morning and was about to contact Airbnb when a booking request came up for Easter - I have been hosting for 9 years and I found it extremely embarassing that I had to decline the Airbnb booking - (I was assured by Airbnb that this would not affect my super host status.  What was really annoying is that I then got a message from Airbnb suggesting I offer different dates - very silly as the booking was for EASTER!! break.  I have blocked out the dates myself to ensure there is no further double booking.  They asked me to take a screen shot of Booking.com calendar which I have sent to them so hopefully it is resolved soon.

I have recieved a 4 day booking + an inquiry for that w/e - that's how I became aware of the problem.

Chris232
Level 10
Petersfield, United Kingdom

@Karla195  @Marlous0 

The same has just happened here, already had a double booking.

Have had to go through the whole calender to block of dates alreay booked.

 

Getting seriously fed up with the incompetence of the AirBNB platform

Jane963
Level 1
Haddenham, United Kingdom

The same happened to me! All booking.com reservations were blocked on airbnb and then they just disappeared! The dates blocked on booking.com are appearing still but not the reservations. Luckily I noticed before a double booking but have had to manually block dates on airbnb as Chris did. Let me know if you hear from airbnb or if we need to contact them directly as this is obviously their issue.

note below I posted their (inadequate) reply!

 

Same problem in Greece. Luckily i had no double reservations! 

This is their reply...

 

I hope this message finds you well. I already forwarded your concern to our technical support so that the syncing issue with your Airbnb calendar will be sync to your other platform calendar.

I'd like to offer as much assistance as possible to ensure the best possible outcome for this situation but this issue is out of our scope and rest assured that our technical people can fix it as soon as possible and will receive update about this matter from them. If you don't have any further questions or concerns I will have to go ahead and close out this case.

Don't worry, if you have any other questions or concerns especially same issue and if the issue involve cancellation or penalties you can prefer to this reference number 54480706, so that we can help you provide proper resolution. You may reply to this message or you can even give us a call at 1-415-800-5959 and we'll be able to help you right where we left off as your case is important to us.

Best,
Maria
Karla
Karla17:26
Maria you can not close off this case as I just got a booking that is not available, this could be an ongoing problem and I want it dealt with ASAP and it noted that I will not be penalised for cancelling bookings that come in anytime from 5pm on 5 April until it is fixed
Jane963
Level 1
Haddenham, United Kingdom

Karla, your case sounds much worse than ours. We only have one letting and take bookings mainly through booking.com. Just a few through airbnb. I often don't look but luckily wanted to check the arrival time of an airbnb guest and then noticed the calendar issue. I will contact airbnb as well so that they know it isn't just you. Jane

 

Thanks Jane. I appreciate your support. Booking.com is our main source of bookings also.

I have since blocked out the dates until the problem is fixed & cancelled the Airbnb booking.

Hypothetical question...

Because I cancelled the booking (1st time ever), it still appears on my calendar to prevent any future bookings & as a way to punish hosts!

What if my Booking.com guest cancels, but no-one else can book as the calendars are synched and the Booking.com end wil or may consider the Airbnb cancellation a "booking"?

Clear as mud! LOL!

I'm concerned as guests last Easter cancelled absolutely last minute as they were "sick" and we lost out on money for one of the busiest times of the year.

Problem solved!

Robin4
Level 10
Mount Barker, Australia

@Karla195 

Like you, I am using another platform as well as Airbnb and through being here on the Community Centre for 3 years I have learned not to trust calendar syncing....it does work, but it doesn't. Many users report double bookings  due to the failure of one platforms syncing system or the other.

For that reason I have specifically chosen not to be involved with calendar syncing. As soon as a booking comes in on one platform I manually block those dates on the other. I do have reasonably high booking rates getting around 12-15 reservations per month and I am having no issues doing it this way. Both platforms apps are downloaded to my phone so the whole procedure is quite seemless and no matter where I am I can attend to accepting and calendar blocking quickly and, my judgement hasn't let me down yet.

The Airbnb platform is much like the Boeing 737 Max8 aircraft. Way too much 'tinkering' is going on with the site programming, and when you start fiddling around with one aspect you are sure to create problems in another.

 

Karla, handle your bookings manually and you will leave these inept issues behind you.

I sometimes think we hosts are far more professional at what we do than Airbnb are at what they do! 

 

Cheers......Rob 

 

love your analogy Rob! Cheers

Regina273
Level 2
Westport, Ireland

I had same issue this morning,

The Issue is with Booking.com, not AirBnB. Fix is to Sync booking.com calendars manually. 

Hope this helps you all. 

Thanks Regina, how do you know it's Booking.com to blame? I may have to eat some humble pie!