pre approvals query

[Peter1298]

Hello All! 

I have the pre-approval setting. We recently received an enquiry on chat from a new member who didnt have a profile or any reviews. I replied to her enquiry, also asking her to tell us a bit about herself so we could decide whether to pre-approve her or not. 

Because she didnt reply, the pre approval time lapsed and so now I have lost 2 peak period nights which have been blocked on my calendar.

My question is what should I have done instead? Thank you in advance for any advice you can give me.

- Peter

[Sarah977]

@Peter1298  When someone sends an Inquiry, just reply to their message, you don't have to click on preapprove or decline. Simply replying within 24 hours will stop the response time clock from ticking. I don't know why your calendar would have been blocked on an inquiry, it shouldn't be. Lots of guests send Inquiries and never follow through with a booking. They may have sent out 10 Inquiries for all you know.

Booking Requests you do have to click on Approve or Decline within 24 hours, but that doesn't stop you from exchanging a message with the guest if you want to before clicking anything.

[Peter1298]

Hi Sarah, thank you for your comments. So now my guest has replied but cannot now book her 2 nights because they are blocked on my calendar. What to do?

Thanks again, Peter

[Sarah977]

@Peter1298  I don't understand why they are blocked. If you already preapproved her, I wonder if that blocked the dates. If so, there is no reason she shouldn't be able to book them, as they would be saved for her. If you didn't pre-approve, have you tried manually unblocking them? If none of that works, you'll need to phone Airbnb to find out what's going on.

[Peter1298]

hi again Sarah! no i didnt pre-approve her. i only answered her query and requested she reply and tell me about herself (she is new to airbnb and has no bio or reviews). so now she wants to book but I cannot pre approve her has the dates she indicated are now unavailable (blocked) by airbnb on my host calendar.

[Helen56]

You should be able to unblock the dates yourself.  Go to the calendar, click on the dates, click the available button.

[Karen74]

Do you mean instabook instead of pre-approval?  I doesn;t make sense otherwise.  Try calling Airbnb 415 800-5959

[Sally221]

My calendar started blocking dates when a guest sent an inquiry, rather frustrating when it was for several days and it was clear that ours was not the right place for a family of 5 planning on using only public transport.There are all kinds of issues cropping up right nowwith late or partial payments, instant book being disabled (mine is) and guests who are unable to cancel within the 48 hour period. I figue that the folks who are posting about this are the tip of the iceberg. I'm trying out other platforms but will likely end up renting to grad students,  I'm sad about this , I've loved hosting so much, Sally