Pre-booking message

[Traci1]

Can someone explain at what step in the process a guest receives the 'pre-booking message' and any advice on what it should say? Thank you in advance!

[Christine1]

@Traci1

The pre-booking message will pop up when you have instant booking activated on your listing. potential guests will get this message just before they request to book!

Regards, Christine.

[Traci1]

Ah, got it. Thank you!

[Lynne32]

This explains why my pre-booking message is sometimes inaccessible to amend!

It must happen when I switch off Instant Booking.

AIRbnb should add a note to that page to explain this.

Thanks for solving the mystery!

Regards,

Lynne Haywood

[Sean95]

This is incorrect. The pre-booking message is shown, idiotically, AFTER the guest has booked and paid. See my thread here: https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/Major-design-flaw-and-misinformation-in-the-UI-regarding...

[Alice-and-Jeff0]

The pre-booking message is used only with instant book.  When a guest starts the process, and requests to book, they will be sent this "pre-booking message" before confirming their instant book option.  According to Airbnb's informational pop-up associated: 

Pre-booking message

Guests see this message before booking. This is an opportunity to say hello and add any final details they should know.  

Here's what we say (you have a character limit):

Thank you for choosing us.  Please read the house rules carefully.  Once you've booked and are ready to travel, we look forward to getting to know what's bringing you to Durham.  Let's keep in touch! 

Without the opportunity to go through the Instant Book process without actually booking something, I'm trying to recall when this message comes up in the process but can't. 

[Christine1]

If you look at the new section for setting your house rules which guests agree to, then this is one of the options/settings which you can establish.

Regards, Christine.

[Sean95]

This is incorrect. The pre-booking message is shown AFTER the guest has booked and paid. See my thread here: https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/Major-design-flaw-and-misinformation-in-the-UI-regarding...

[Bree76]

So then why is it a "pre  booking" message if they don't get it until afterward?

[Michelle140]

I just added a pre-booking message for my listing. I like the "general" message that was given as an example, but I opted to use the limited space to make a direct point of my two most often complaints (I live in a rural area and I have pets, which can smell sometimes).

I'm really tired of getting docked on cleanliness because I have pets and so it smells like pets sometimes (which is clearly described in my listing). And I seriously just got a 2/5 on location because I'm further removed than they were expecting, lol. Airbnb really needs to get rid of that rating. It's all in the eye of the beholder. I've definitely had more guests who have specifically said they loved the location than people complaining about it, but it's still frustrating 😉

[Michel205]

Make these facts even more obvious  and prominent in your listing. 

[Floyd3]

I usually have the same problem regarding my house location! also very frustrating by the way. I just added more information to my listing that it may be more noticeable for guests, and I also urge them on the pre-booking message to carefully read it.

[Bree76]

I totally get that. I get docked on things that are specifically noted ahead of time and peopel book anyway. It sucks that they are allowed to dock us on that stuff. 

[Szilvia9]

OMG guys! I’m so gratful for this conversation. I always used this pre-booking automatic message as a welcome message and now I know why. I’m Hungarian and when I listed my accommodation I used ABB in Hungarian to not misunderstand anything but... I realized now that the Hungarian translation at this section is completly messed up and it says it’s a welcome message for those who book with instant booking option and the message title is: “Köszöntö” which means “Welcome” 😲 instead of “Your welcome message before booking” and if their answer is not good for the host, the host can cancel the booking without penalty. So it says nowhere it’s a pre-booking message. Now if I check in English it says only, guests will see your message before they confirm their reservation.

So actually it’s not a translation but it’s a totally other description of this ‘pre-booking’ message. I don’t know why they want to confuse the hosts with this.

[Sean95]

All of the responses are WRONG. Everyone is just replying to you based on what they EXPECT after reading AirBnB's INCORRECT publications. 

The correct answer is that the pre-booking message is shown AFTER the guest has already booked and paid. Stupid, right?

See my thread here: https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/Major-design-flaw-and-misinformation-in-the-UI-regarding...