I have been involved with AirBNB about a year and am starting to learn some of the tricks of guests. Have had many guests book weeks to months ahead and then cancel just within their full refund period by hours. It is obvious they go shopping for their ideal unit by booking several locations and then cancelling all but the one they decide on. Some I am sure book way more days that they plan to stay to give themselves options for dates as well, giving them more time to decide while holding us hostage. I have seen this at least twice by monitoring other host sites and see the same people in their reviews for the period they cancelled with us. I have for the last 3 months changed all my listings to Strict but high season summer is coming and with low availability, many guests rent months earlier to ensure availability. So with a person holding like 3 weeks July into August and then cancel exactly 30 days prior, I now have a opening, but may have missed prime honest bookings already. Until the unit is rebooked, you do not know.
With all the technology AirBnB has, they can certainly track if a guest has more than one booking for a certain period or even area (as we are located in a slightly independent location for 20 miles either way) and apply some kind of addtional fine if they cancel in the full refund period or as a minimum let you know that was the case and you can flag that guest for future refereence!
One other quick thing for thought. We had a booking less that 48 hr old, when we were told by the property managegemnt, they were doing repairs and plumbing sevice would not be available during that period. The booking was for 2 nites in one of our lower priced units. With over a week to the checkin we explainded to the guest, offering them a discout and alternate dates , if they wanted, requesting them to cancel. They did not so we were forced to cancel them on our end. Of course this triggered AirBNB to follow their host cancelation policy. The fine was $129.00 out of a potential $250.00 stay, deducted from another guest payout we had (the canceled guest had not even been charged anythng yet)??? To me this is ridiculous and even it the reason was not covered under their onerous policy, I am curious what else they would have us do. Let the guest come and not have toilet or water in their suite. Should we have gazed into our crystal ball and know the repairs were to happen when the booking was made? Not only that but it goes agains your Superhost rating through no fault of your own. I thougt AirBnB was one of the better applications, but only when everything goes the right way, but they ensure they get paid (with no money outlay themselves) even when you don't!
