two requests for the same week??

[Stephany81]

Hi! I had a rental request today, had a lovely message thread going and I sent her a special offer.  She's waiting for her husband to come home to complete the booking.  In the meantime, I received a request for several of the same nights as #1, and now those nights are no longer available for the special offer for #1.  Does this mean #2 actually booked? My options for her are "accept" or "decline".  I've not had this happen before so I want to handle this ethically.

[Trude0]

It depends if you have Instant Book activated or not. (Check your settings.)

If you are asked to accept or decline no 2, then it sounds like you don’t have Instant Book, and you can decline. Not great, but not a big issue, unless you decline several bookings. 

If you were on Instant Book, #2 would already have a confirmed booking, and you would not be able to decline, you would have your cancel, if you wanted to accept #1. Cancelling should definitely be avoided. 

I suggest you

1) Urgently contact #1 and explain that the special offer does not reserve the dates, you have another request, and if they want to book, they need to do so by x o’clock (1 hour before the deadline to accept/decline #2)

2) Urgently contact #2 and explain that

you have another request, and will not be able to accept/decline until latest at y o’clock (deadline). Just so the guest knows it may take a while till he/she hears from you. Some guests don’t understand request to book, and think that they already have a confirmed booking. 

[Joelle43]

Hello @Stephany81 

If you are only see "accept" or "decline" then reservation #2 has come through as a trip request which trumps the "enquiry" that you received earlier which is why the dates for trip #2 have blocked your calendar.

You only have 24 hours to accept reservation #2 to keep your acceptance rate up so don't hold out in the hope that #1 finally gets back to you. Get in touch with both to get a gut feeling about how good a guest they might be.    Great advice from @Trude0 

If you want more information on the difference between these type of reservations, read the guide below:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Community-Guides/GUIDE-Handling-Enquiries-and-Bookings/td-p/1895...

All the best and let us know who you choose😉

Joëlle

[Zheng49]

A booking request trumps an inquiry. I would accept/decline the booking request first. 

Otherwise, the dates are blocked, and noone can book these dates anyways. 

[Frances3408]

@Stephany81 . Hi Stephany, this happens to me a lot on one listing and actually happened last weekend. Like you I got an enquiry we discussed the issue (too many pets) then she said she would come back to me. 5 hours later I got a request to book for exact same dates. It had no issues so i accepted the second one.

I've lost count of the number of enquires that dont come back, including special offers so now I am just straightforward in my process. If I get another request while there is a special offer, like @Trude0  said, give them onlya  few hours deadlineTo me its not an ethical dilemma as they know an enquiry is not a deposit so doesnt get them to the head of the queue.