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Hi all, my question is in the title. Does a pre-approved guest, for whom I did not hold the dates, get notified if someone else Instant Books within the 24-hour period they have to accept the pre-approval?
Like, from Airbnb: “Sorry, the place you were considering is no longer available for your selected dates.” or something like that?
Happy New Year (My 1st new topic of the year…)
Bob
When you do pre-approval (I would never do this), you have the option to block out the date for 24 hours.
If you haven’t used this setting then anyone can book within the period on IB. The guest you have pre-approved won’t be notified of other bookings but it will show your place is no longer available to book.
As a guest, I always write to the host first to ask their pet policy. (A very, very annoying thing with AirBnB is that hosts are not required to disclose their pet policy on their listing. I have to write to find out before I can instant book. MY listing has the pet policy spelled out.)
Because I have to do this, I always receive a message from the host and almost always a separate pre-approval invitation generated by AirBnB, authorized by the host of course.
As a guest I always find the pre-approval message highly motivating to book that place. It’s one click and it looks like the host really wants you and somehow I find that reassuring.
Consequently as a host, I always send a pre-approval message when given the opportunity to do so by the platform. Most, but not all, guests will book when they receive pre approval.
I do so if the guest has good reviews and has sent a message that puts me at ease. But not all inquiries fit those parameters. If they ask some question that shows they never read the listing info, or are asking for something I don’t provide, I’m not going to pre-approve it without further communication that lets me feel it will be a good guest.
It is a check box for hosts whether they allow pets. You can find it in their listings online by going to “house Rules” and it will be in the section “what’s allowed”.
“Guests don’t read”
I think that @SleepingCoyote is probably talking about the host’s policy, not just whether or not they allow pets. Many of us have specific policies. For instance, I only accept dogs and not other animals but Airbnb doesn’t have a way for hosts to say “dog friendly”, only a way to say “pet friendly”. And a lot of hosts have weight or breed restrictions or require crating, that kind of thing. And I agree with coyote that it’s ideal that hosts explain their pet policy in their house rules.
Exactly. I have a big dog and a little dog and I don’t crate them. So I have to write to the host and that’s usually when I learn things like small dogs only.
You’re nicer than I am. I’m not sending out a bunch of messages and asking. I go by exactly what they have in their House Rules. If they don’t have restrictions in their house rules then there are none.
Yikes JJD! I would be terrified to do that for fearing of being asked to leave! I’m not nice at all, I’m just trying not to get thrown out 
Probably AirBnB Customer Service would side with you. But that is cold comfort if you’ve booked a rural place.
You’re not going to get thrown out. Haven’t you noticed all those hosts who come on and describe how watched on cameras or even from next door as their guests threw a raging party but didn’t bother going over to kick them out? 
Besides, I’m not sneaking my dog in. It’s not as if they won’t know about her until I get there (because that would be truly weird). I always mention that I’m bringing my dog and tell them a little about her in my booking message. They know right away when I book, not when I arrive.
I’m not being sneaky or underhanded. I’m just not going to waste my time or a bunch of hosts’ time contacting them all and asking about bringing her. And I am certainly not going to wait around for them to get back to me. I will read the house rules (all of them, lol 
) and respect them but it’s not my problem if they don’t have their house rules filled out completely.
Of course, if they have a house rule that says that I have to get their approval to bring a dog prior to booking then I will contact them first. Otherwise, I’m just going to book and inform them of my dog at that time. That’s not an idiosyncrasy on my part, that is the way that the system is set up. And for the most part, it is what is expected.
And, never once has it not worked out. I’ve never booked and then had a host say, “oh we only allow cats” or something. Most hosts have it together. I think you may be underestimating that.
But, I think it’s okay that you want to ask. I’m just saying that you’re not usually expected to ask - unless it’s in the house rules that you must. However, I do actually have it in my house rules that dogs must be pre-approved and still only about 1% of people ask 
Wow–that means 99% of your dog people show up with unapproved dogs?
What AirBnB should do is: If a host wants to offer the amenity “pet friendly” and checks that box, then a form appears with check boxes covering the major issues of pet hosting—breeds, size, FEE, crating, how many animals allowed, what species allowed, and host pre approval required (or not). Then the bullet points are generated for guests to see.
They already do something similar, but not as elaborate, for several other amenities, such as WiFi (you can let AIr populate the speed or not) and shampoo, as I recall.
I use IB so don’t need to pre-approve bookings @SleepingCoyote guests can just click to IB if they want to book.
I found when I used the pre-approval years back bookings never converted.
No, we’ve only ever had one guest show up with a dog unexpectedly. Guests tend to either tell me they’re bringing their dogs or ask me about bringing them (it’s about half and half) in the message they send when they IB. A certain amount don’t mention it until later, along with an apologetic message because they’ve just then read the house rules (I guess people really don’t want to commit to reading until after they book, lol).
It’s not really a big deal and I only very rarely follow up on it. Though, when I was a new host, I did so more often. It’s not about specific requirements. I don’t have any weight, breed or number limits. Every once in a while I’ll ask people about their dogs, whether they can be trusted to be left alone or, if not, what the plan is going to be, like taking them with or using a crate or whatever. I’m not concerned with the details of the plan as much as whether or not there is a plan. There are no bad dogs, only irresponsible dog owners.
These days so many of our guests are repeats anyway so I don’t need to ask them. But I’m also generally more relaxed about guests than I used to be. And we don’t do same-day flips anymore either so that takes a lot of pressure off - if something was to get messed up by a dog we have more time to fix it.
I keep the rule because we have 4 units total (including our own) that share the halls, stairs, parking and yard. It’s its own little community with a lot of moving parts (and a fluctuating cast and number of dogs!) so it can sometimes be a bit of a balancing act to keep the whole thing happy, safe and comfortable.
The house rule about requiring pre-approval is primarily just a type of fail-safe at this point. Airbnb will and has honored it (with a penalty-free cancelation) when a guest has booked without getting preapproval for their dogs and is being unreasonable somehow (even if it’s not really about the dog ). The rule specifically mentions, “so please confirm that we can accommodate your dog for the dates of your stay prior to booking.”
*Because you are also dog-friendly I want to say that it really makes a difference when hosts mention a guest’s dogs in the review. I don’t ever hassle my IBs that didn’t read the house rules if their dogs are mentioned (positively) in their reviews.
But those things are for the benefit of guests, not hosts. Airbnb isn’t particularly interested in making things easier for hosts, rather the contrary.
It would benefit guests to have the details of the pet policy too. At the very least, listings should be labeled as dog friendly or cat friendly or both. Ideally, it would say big dog or little dog or both too. It’s a real hassle to go through pet-friendly listings no matter what kind of pet you’re traveling with and, yet, it is wholly understandable that different listings will have different restrictions.
This is one of the basics of the listing info. And it is not limited to dogs and cats - it is just ‘pets’.
I don’t understand what you’re saying.
Yes, it says “Pet Friendly” but that doesn’t mean that all types of pets are accepted at any listing that says it’s pet friendly, because they generally are not. It would be helpful to at least divide it between dogs and cats because those are the most common pets that people travel with and they also seem to be the most common to be mutually exclusive.
Are you concerned about rabbits or birds or something? Lol. I cover that by saying “dogs only”.
Please explain this.
Explain what? You seem to have some kind of agenda here, what is it?
I’m not understanding the generalism about pets. The check box is pretty exacting - either you accept pets or not.