Advice on amending a booking

[Holly835]

I’m asking on behalf of my father. He’s recently been diagnosed with cancer in his brain and can no longer travel. Sadly he does not have insurance. He has booked to go to South Africa in January with my mum, my brother and some family friends. He booked a villa for 10nights. My brother and the friends are still wanting to go, it’s just my dad and mum that are not. However they have decided they only want to stay in the villa for 5 nights. So my mum contacted the hosts, explained the situation and asked if they would amend the booking to 5 nights and she was happy to pay the 50% cancellation fee on the 5 cancelled nights as per their policy. The host agreed this was fine yesterday. However they then sent a message today saying air b n b have advised them that we need to cancel and our guests to rebook - meaning my parents lose 50% of the booking as that is the cancellation policy. I understand about damage and liability but my mum and dad have said they are happy to front any damage as the booker and it seems a bit ridiculous they have to rebook when it will have no doubt increased as it’s so last minute now and also it’s my brother so he is a relation, it’s not like a hen/stag party where it’s a completely different group of people attending, it’s just my mum and dad who can no longer go. So not only will my parents lose 50% but all the other people suffer as they will have lost out on the first booking and probably have to pay more to rebook it. Surely there is something that can be done considering the circumstances? They were trying to be open and honest with the host and if they agreed to the amended dates they could have rented it out for the 5 days my parents cancelled given its peak season and still got the cancellation fee from my parents so it would have been a win win for both parties. I feel like they are been unfairly treated. 

[Shelley159]

Hi @Holly835 

I agree with you that if the host is using smart pricing and the accommodation is near the coast, the January price will likely be more expensive now if the dates had to be re-booked. You can check the prices of unbooked January nights on the host's calendar.

Here's what I would do. Message the host:

Hi X, thank you for getting back to us about the cancellation. Before we cancel, we just wanted to get some feedback from experienced users in the Airbnb Community Center to decide how to proceed. I have therefore posted the following message (see below) and will wait for some replies and then get back to you [Paste the entire message that you posted here, in the message thread].

Hopefully when the host reads it the way you explain it and thinks from the perspective of an independent reader, they will re-think their position. 

[Holly835]

Thank you for the advice Shelley. Sounds a fair course of action. I’m sure you can understand my parents are set to lose a lot of money from this trip so they are trying to recoup where possible. Allowing them to amend the booking means they get some money back and their family and friends still get to use the villa for 5 nights. Even if they don’t accept the amendment to the dates it would be nice if they still let their guests go on their booking. Making them cancel it completely because my parents can’t go feels like a punishment to me!