Firm Cancellation - what happens if you accept a DATE CHANGE

[Susan1188]

I have a guest that booked FIRM 6 weeks ago and now wants to cancel 5 days before arrival.

If I agree to a date change, will the cancellation window be open again and allow the guest to cancel for free?

This was the classic guest scam on VRBO a while back - asking for. a date change so they would once again be in the cancellation times, once the date change went thru they would cancel for free.

Anyone have experience with this?  Please only answer if you have first hand experience not if you are just guessing.

Thank you everybody!

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Susan1188 When we have moved bookings (due to shutdown) the booking date ........

Finally the last line in your post is just rude to all the helpful folks on this community centre. In fact I think I shall delete the answer I just wrote and leave you guessing as to what will happen.

[Susan1188]

Many heartfelt apologies for my "just guessing" comment.

Written too quickly and because I am distressed and confronted with a last minute cancellation for a 3 week Christmas and New Year's booking, and have, in the past, been given wrong advice from people who were trying to be helpful but didn't have first hand experience.

It is impossible to redact posts on this forum so just publishing here my apologies for that rude line.

I now have the answer to my question which I will share with everyone who cares to know:

First let me clarify I am talking about FIRM cancellation policy, which is: guest can cancel for free up to 1 month before arrival, then gets 50% refund until 7 days before arrival.  Not Strict or Non refundable.   FIRM cancellation is similar to VRBO policies.

=> If you agree to move the booking, the cancellation window opens up again.

And so, the guest can indeed cancel for free if you agree to move the booking one month out.

@Mike-And-Jane0  Surely that is what happened with you?  I see you are on STRICT and NON REFUNDABLE,  not on Firm, perhaps you had this experience with firm and that is why you are no longer using it?  Thanks so much if you share your experience despite my offensive line.

So fellow hosts please know that agreeing to a date change, on a FIRM policy, is the same as giving the guest free full cancellation.

I hope that is helpful to others and again apologies for the few words written in haste because of my distress over this last minute Christmas and New Year's cancellation request.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Susan1188 when we rescheduled a strict booking the 'booking date' didn't change so the 48 hr free cancellation period was not available but the 50% cancellation would have been (although the guest didn't cancel).

[Ricardo85]

If I'm not mistaken, this only occurs if the request for change is made by the guest. If done by the host, the "booking date" is changed and, consequently, the guest has 48 hours to cancel with a 100% refund.

[Ann72]

@Susan1188  A date change by the guest under Strict cancellation is forever tied to the original booking date.  I had a guest try to game the system by changing and then cancelling under my Strict policy, and although Airbnb tried to get me to refund him, I refused because I was so offended by his behavior.  Thank you for the intel regarding the Firm policy - I hadn’t planned to switch but now definitely will not.

PS:  You can edit your posts for at least a few minutes after posting by choosing “edit” under the arrow to the right of your name.

[Huma0]

@Ann72 

That's good to know and reassures me that I should stick with my Strict policy. 

I recently had a guest wanting to change his dates to three months later, which I would have agreed to, but he also wanted to half the length of the stay. From what you are saying, if I had agreed, he would have still had to pay the 50% + fees for the booking if he cancelled after the date change, even if he did so within 48 hours?

[Ann72]

Yes, absolutely @Huma0.  It really protects the hosts from guests who want to try to game the booking in this fashion.

[Michael7440]

The 50% refund is not as you would think. We just had guest do this and called  Airbnb support . We asked specifically if we accept the change, a booking from 14 days to 5, made under 30 days with a strict cancellation policy would we get 50% of the cancelled days back. She assured us multiple times we would so we accepted. That was not the case. Our pay out seemed to be based only on the remaining days they kept if the booking. After 5 days and speaking with 8 people I requested a supervisor call us. It took a full hour for them to explain that the form cancellation policy means you will get 50% of the booked days back. Because the original booking was for $3500 our payout was $1750. The issue I had was that the booking fee for those remaining 5 days came to $1750 so clearly the 50% from the cancelled days were not and would not be applied. So we were out that $1750 with no refund because as far as Airbnb is concerned the $1750 is equal to half the booking.  The firm cancellation policy is deliberately vague. What is even more odd to me is that Airbnb loses $$ with this interpretation. Lesson learned DO NOT ACCEOT THE GUEST CHANGE

[Mar125]

ask the guest to book the new date as a new reservation and tell him you will get him free refund on the old reservation once he books new. just list another listing for the same address. and when he submit a book request,  ask him to agree that the new reservation is non refundable. 

[Helen744]

@Susan1188 Yes this is the case although I have not seen it in a while.I would check if your guest cancelled now if they would lose most of their money if so then it is certainly possible.Scams are scams because we do not anticipate them . There are a few blips in the system and this is one of them .Just do not refund and if they have made an inquiry and you do not have Instant book then you do not have to actually accept the booking.Have they just inquired or made a booking ?... H