We have the first two weekends in April available; in fact the first two weeks seem to be wide open. I was searching incognito for April 13-15 and noticed our listing wasn’t coming up at all. We have our cancellation policy as Strict and it’s the updated choice that has the 48 hour free cancellation window. I had chosen the free 48 hour cancellation when it first came available, before it became standard. Anyway, the search default was automatically set to “Free Cancellation”. The only listings that show up are those with Moderate or Flexible Cancellation policies. My listing doesn’t show up unless I uncheck the free cancellation. Is this a mistake, or is this Airbnb’s way of forcing us to change our cancellation policy? I’m not sure what to do at this point. I don’t think most people searching are going to deliberately uncheck that filter, and I thought by offering the 48 hours to cancel that I was offering free cancellation, but I guess it’s not free unless the reservation is 14 days out.
Hi Arlene,
I don’t know about your current issue. I’ve not come across it , yet ! I’ve been emailed by airbnb saying its happening, basically whether we like it or not.
I’ve just made a booking to stay in Bath in for 7 people, all fine, and we had sent an enquiry to another host. We booked and then three other host we had made an enquiry got back to us, offering a bigger discount. I basically said thank you but had already booked now. They replied that i could now cancel my booking within 48 hours and could go with them instead.
Ooooh , I don’t like that ! It seems to be encouraging cut throat business, undermining other hosts.
What do you think about this latest change ? You must have quiet liked it or wouldn’t have signed up to it, can I ask what your reason was please ?
Ugh, me either. There is another post about the cancellation policy. No one had thought of one host selling out another.
Hi. I was checking my listing this morning and that was not the case for me. Could be different in different countries though - if you can give me a way to find your listing I will do a search from here in Australia and see what I get.
@Kerry - I can’t speak for Arlene, but AirBnB is now including “free cancellation” as part of the strict cancellation policy if a guest cancels within 48 hours of booking and the check-in date is at least 14 days away. Arlene didn’t sign up for it - it’s the default now.