How long to wait?

[Kathleane0]

Yesterday at 4:30 p.m. a potential guest reserved a room in my home asking for a discount. I replied 2 hours later, (by the way, Airbnb has not been sending their messages to us on time) But anyway, I replied 2 hours later politely declining their request and asking them to let me know. The next day. I haven't heard from them. I don't mind holding it open for them, but I am concerned that Airbnb may ding me for not accepting or denying them within a specific period of time.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Kathleane0 if it was a booking enquiry you only need to respond and you can ignore Airbnb pushing you to approve/reject. If it was a booking request then you need to approve or reject it. I suspect it was an enquiry so no further action needed by you.

[Kathleane0]

Unfortunately it was a booking request. I forgot about it over the weekend and declined it this morning since I didn't hear from the booker.

[Emiel1]

@Kathleane0 

I try to understand what happened:

A guest sent a booking request and also ask for a discount (the guest should have sent an inquiry !)

You did not want to offer a discount and let them know if they want to continue with the booking request.

(Better strategy: ask the guest to withdraw the booking request within 2 hours, otherwise you will accept it).

Now you are wasting a lot of time waiting for this guest to respond (or never respond), keeping the dates blocked.