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When switching of IB AirBnB now requires you to go to several “are-you-sure-screens”.
It seems they now added another one of their rules to force IB upon hosts.
If you are not using IB, you are not able to cancel for free if the guests break the house rules!!!
What is next? No more host protection program if not using IB?
That is beyond unbelievable and, well, unconscionable. Just wrong, wrong, WRONG!
For those who share their homes, they should be able to say no to IB!!
Ok, so…you currently use IB, and then were going to turn it off, and that is the message you got, which included not being able to cancel penalty-free if guests break house rules? Just trying to understand where that screen shot came from.
You know, this push to IB could backfire on them in more ways than one obviously, but especially when there are going to be many experienced hosts who have for years urged their friends and family to use airbnb for travel or hosting, suddenly start telling everyone to NOT use airbnb!
I don’t see the downside for guests. As a guest I wish everyone had it.
Ah, I see your point.
You can’t cancel penalty free now if guests break your house rules?
I am under the impression that I can cancel if a guest is breaking my house rules, without penalty. I don’t have IB though.
Me too, so this is confusing. A bit unfair.
I’m more curious about this now 
Why is it you want IB only?
For instance, I know you have a trip coming up to celebrate your retirement, and that you are treating your friends to a vacation with you to celebrate.
As a host, I would want to know that because it would give me the opportunity to leave a little something special for you, even if it was just a “Happy Retirement” card. Or maybe just an extra nice vase of flowers for your room with a 'Happy Retirement" card attached.
With IB, I wouldn’t know the circumstances of your stay at my place ( if I had a place that a separate unit from my home).
I like it because I don’t like waiting for replies. I don’t like the feeling that I somehow wasn’t “good enough” for your rental (though I’ve only been turned down once). If I were booking your place for my retirement trip you would know because I would tell you in the message I send when I book.
Oh, gotcha 
I was under the impression that IB guests didn’t send messages. Just booked and showed up!
It does make sense for guests. It appeals to our sense of immediate gratification.
But they don’t have to send a message?!! They can just book and show up.
I’m completely the opposite…If I am going to ABB my holiday, I want there to be a real host, otherwise I’ll just use the Marriott, so I would welcome the interchange before booking.
They could but the vast majority of my guests send a message as soon as they book. Then I message back asking when they will arrive or if they told me that I’ll say “Thanks, drive safe, etc.” I exchange several messages with most my guests and about 90% of them are IB.Edit: Some even message first like they didn’t notice they could IB then the IB request follows soon after the initial request.
I’m pretty sure you use IB you have to also send a message. With all my IB guests, I’ve had at least 3-4 messages back and forth before they arrive. It’s just nice as a guest to know ASAP that you got a place.
Well, I hate with all my soul IB, but I was on the need to turn it on because I feel I was forced to do it.
You are all talking by how Airbnb is trying to seduce or force hosts to use IB by several benefits the give you but the more aggressive way they are forcing us to adopt IB is on the search page. It seems that my user is one of their test users who can’t browse listings on a search without IB. I just can’t do it. The IB filter is there but even if I turn it off it continue showing me the same amount of listings which are all IB. This isn’t a bug because one of the arguments of the search URL is IB_override =true if you know what I mean.
So, in the future, you might be able to opt out from IB but you are going to lose a big percent of users that will not be able to see your listing.
I do not use IB renting rooms in my personal home because I am frequently out of town and sometimes have a hectic work schedule and may not be able to accommodate guests properly, especially if they book on short notice and I am away. I have had guests wanting to exceed my limit for the room (bring air mattresses), bring small children (my listing is adult only), bring large church groups for 1 bedroom. I would be okay with IB if I could cancel if I was not going to be available or did not think the guest was a good fit.
VRBO sends a “request to book” and then you simply accept or reject. I think this works well.
I doubt they will force old listings into this new arrangement, so no need for me to waste podium time about how fast I would be gone from Airbnb if they did. The ones I see hurting IS existing hosts, without it, since IB is a strong competitive tool, from a guest point of view.
