This forum is dedicated to connecting hosts with other hosts. Sign up to get the latest updates and news just for AirBnb hosts! Note that we are not affiliated with Airbnb - we are just passionate hosts!
Anybody notice that Airbnb changed our policies? Seems to be new policies that have been added. I checked and we were automatically put in a new category with “full refund five days prior.”
That’s not what we’d prefer. We changed to “Firm,” which is what we had been…. And that is defined as NEW.
We were not notified of the change.
I’m curious what cancellation policies others have chosen. I welcome your thoughts. Thank you.
The only way you can avoid being subjected to any advertising medium’s policies is by going alone. If you don’t, then you are going to have to suck up their rules. regulations and policies for your business I’m afraid.
I have a flexible cancellation policy. I don’t often get cancellations but when I do, I find it’s pretty easy to fill the dates.
If not, because I’m booked year round, I use those couple of days to do overdue maintenance work.
Either way, it’s no problem.
this isn’t a new category, that’s Moderate, i use that. Thanks for the heads up, I checked mine and they are all still as they should be, but you never know what will happen when they roll out something new.
I started out with Flexible (1 day notice required) but got a few too many last minute cancellations. So I switched to Moderate (5 days) and it made a big difference, now if people cancel they tend to do so a week ahead of time, not always enough time to get another booking (weekdays esp).
I tried the option with the non-refundable policy, where they get a discount for 0 cancellation options, and i found everyone who needed to cancel and had gotten the discount still begged me to refund them anyway. every single one of them so i stopped offering it, let them eat their own damn cake!
Guess I haven’t checked in six month then. I was surprised to see it changed without my knowledge.
one of the categories currently has a “new” box next to it.
yes it does but it’s the one that was introduced about six months back 
Yes we had a thread or two about the changes when they were introduced.
Don’t be. People complain about that all the time. They send out messages but people delete without reading or it goes to junk. Two methods to avoid these surprises are to read this forum regularly and to also check Airbnb regularly. Changing what you do is much more likely to have a good result than expecting Airbnb to change.
You really should check all your settings at least once a week, some hosts say they check every day. Hosts have found their check-in windows changed to “flexible”, discounts checked when they never set any discounts, etc.
A couple months ago Airbnb had a tech glitch which resulted in hosts all over the world all supposedly offering pools, hot tubs, ski in, ski out, oceanfront, etc., etc. 
We all suddenly had every amenity on the amenities list.
Just checked mine and they had switched my listing to fully refundable up until the day before arrival… SERIOUSLY WTF Airbnb!!
So thankful that you checked. Makes me feel better about posting the question.