Double booked on airbnb and vrbo, what do I do?

[Tammy678]

One guest booked our home for March 2025. Another guest booked 10 days later on Vrbo the same dates. What do I do?

[Victoria1437]

Contact guest on each platform and explain and ask them voluntarily cancel with 100% refund. Good luck getting VRBO to support you.

[Helen3]

It would be unfair to ask the guests who booked in good faith and would lose booking fees if they cancelled to cancel because of the hosts error @Victoria1437 

there's no guarantee a host would refund them and some unscrupulous hosts don't . 

@Tammy678 what did you think was going to happen if you hold calendars open across multiple platforms without co-ordinating them? Do remove the Instant Book function from Airbnb until you sort this out.  

[Tammy678]

@Helen3

You are wrong and incorrect in many of your assumptions. 

We reached out to both guests. Neither guest wanted to cancel or change the dates of their booking. We have full refunds up to 60 days before check in on both platforms so neither guest would have lost any money. Both guests could have canceled and/or changed their dates with no penalties.
We reached out to Vrbo this morning. They saw the mistake and owned it. Gave me a waiver while I was on the phone to make sure we weren’t charged a fee and super host status is still intact.  She also apologized several times.
Vrbo & Airbnb both have their systems set up to sync calendars so you can easily list on both platforms. We already had  instant booking turned off on both platforms to prevent this exact situation. A couple years ago it happened but those guests just changed their dates and everybody was happy.

I asked Vrbo what I could do to prevent this from happening again and she suggested we manually sync our calendars every two weeks so we will put a reminder on our phones to make sure we remember to do it. Thanks for your thoughts. And as usually I am amazed at how many incorrect assumptions people make on social platforms that they verbally share in a bold or rude way. Let’s us our manners. But thanks for sharing your thoughts, I truly do appreciate the help. 

[Helen3]

@Tammy678  My comments were based on the information YOU provided 

1. I am not wrong .Just because you may choose to voluntarily refund the guest doesn't mean guests don't lose the Airbnb fee if they cancel

2. Nowhere in your original post did you say the double booking was aVRBO error 

3. I made a general point it would be unfair to ask a guest to cancel when the error was not of their making as they would lose their booking fee. I stand by that comment 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Tammy678 To take @Victoria1437 's advice would be wrong. It is your mistake and you should own it and deal with it yourself. Yes there will be consequences but actions do have consequences.

My advice would be

1) sort out the listing so that you cannot get double bookings. On Airbnb that means switching off Instant Book.

2) Call VRBO and cancel the booking that came in second. 

[Victoria1437]

Yes however my suggestion is a simple effective and amicable way to get resolution because the platforms won’t help you. Don’t appreciate you stating I am wrong when it is good advice. 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Victoria1437 There are far too many stories of guests being offered full refunds by a host and then the host reneging. The only fair way to deal with the guest is for the host to cancel. This also means the guest should get support from Airbnb (don't know about VRBO) in finding another place to stay.

[Victoria1437]

I disagree. It’s all in the approach. 

[Victoria1437]

. 🤣

 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Victoria1437 Oh dear, lets try this paragraph from the hosts cancellation policy. I have  highlighted the bit that is important for @Tammy678 thus demonstrating that, as I said before, your advice is wrong.

Other things to consider

If a Host cannot honor a reservation—regardless of the reason—it’s their responsibility to cancel in a timely manner to allow their guest time to adjust their plans. A Host may not encourage the guest to cancel the reservation.

[Tammy678]

You assumed I didn’t have instant booking turned off, you assumed Vrbo wouldn’t help me, you assumed the guest would pay a fee if they cancelled. You assumed a host can choose to keep all of the guests money if they cancel. You are incorrect about all of these facts. Maybe just ask a few questions before you share your thoughts instead of assuming  if you truly are trying to help people. Have a good day😊

[Ruth413 · Accepted solution]

@Tammy678   

Have you synced your VRBO & Airbnb calendars.  I list with both and although the calendars are synced, I check both of them every time I have a booking to check they block the other calendar off.  I don't and can't rely on them doing it automatically because of the occasional glitch that could happen.   Sometimes they don't automatically do this and you have to refresh the pages for it to work.  

[Tammy678]

Thanks for the great info! I will definitely check when we get a booking to avoid this problem from happening again. 

[Rebecca]

Hi @Tammy678 👋

Did any of the answers below help you resolve the issue? If so, it's always a lovely gesture to mark it as the best answer. It's like a big virtual hug to the member who supported you but also to support other Hosts who may have similar questions in the future. 😊