In the future, I will follow your advice; don’t pre-approve or decline, just respond to their question, especially for a same day booking. Airbnb really makes you feel like you have to do either one. Thanks to you and Cabinhost and Sandytoes for your helpful suggestion!
4 Likes
I am stealing this right now for the decline I am about to issue.
1 Like
Wait, wait, wait…I have a better one for you. It has to do with a bent snorkel.
From the Airbnb email;
"PRE-APPROVE/DECLINE
You have 24 hours to respond
A prompt response helps guests finalize their trips. If you don’t respond to Sophie’s inquiry within 24 hours, it could negatively impact your response "
So what several of you are saying is that replying to the email is a response and you don’t have to hit pre-approve or decline. I find what Airbnb does to be deceptive. They make you feel like you have to Pre-approve or Decline because the clock keeps ticking down if you just respond with an email.
1 Like
Airbnb has the option of choosing to block the dates at that time or to leave the dates open until you receive a firm booking. I almost always choose to leave the dates showing available until the person has booked the property. I see no reason to hold a reservation after you’ve approved it if the person doesn’t immediately book your place. Very happy that Airbnb has given us this option!
1 Like
Yes, you will get several reminders about pre-approving but as long as you’ve responded to the person inquiring, you’re good. There could be several subsequent messages between the two parties and it probably wouldn’t matter but I do try and leave it where my message is the last.
1 Like
That shouldn’t happen. The clock should disappear after your response. The countdown is just to your first response. Try refreshing if that doesn’t happen.
2 Likes
Mike,
Look around very carefully within the Air messaging system. Is there anything at all where you can just hit “reply” - not talking about through your email. Air used to not make this obvious.
You can ignore the pre-approve or decline.
I always initiate dialogue but never pre-approve.
Sorry Mike it sounds like you haven’t fully understand how Airbnb works. You don’t need to do either
All you need to do is respond. Answer their query and if you want their booking, tell them they are welcome to make booking. Then you can forget it unless you here back.
Just make sure you set your listing for a minimum 24 hours notice so you have time to prepare.
I’m using a desktop, Windows 10, Google Chrome. I can Pre-Approve, Decline or send message. My point is if I just send message the clock keeps ticking as though I didn’t do what I had to do yet. If it’s true that I can just ignore Pre-Approve or Decline without any penalty, then it’s very misleading.
1 Like
I am not sure what it says on Airbnb but I am 100% sure that as long as you respond either by declining, pre-approving or sending a message you will be fine.
It is the time that you take to make the INITIAL response that counts by whichever of the three methods - message, accept or decline.
That sounds like a request. I don’t think you get the countdown clock unless they have sent an actual request.
1 Like
I know what you mean. That’s happened to be before where even after I replied the clock was still showing.
It was the first time had received and enquiry and didn’t pre approve straight away so right before the time ran out I increased the price and sent a pre approval lol while I waited to know more from the guest.
No, the countdown clock appears for inquiries. But like I said above, it disappears after you reply. This is easy enough to test. Get someone with an Airbnb account to send you a inquiry.
I wonder if they are having it appear because they want to give the appearance of urgency?
The countdown clock doesn’t disappear for me when replying unless pre-appoved or declined is clicked. This is not new either. This happened last year as well.
1 Like
Airbnb wants hosts to reply to inquiries within 24 hours at most, and as fast as possible in general. If you don’t reply within 24 hours I think it affects your listed response rate. That at least is my understanding. Of course, I’ve not attempted to test it.
Personally, I don’t think is a very useful metric, because it doesn’t quantify the quality of a response. I mean, a full stop would count as a response. But I suppose it’s harder to do better with automated tools. And it’s certainly important (for both hosts and guests) to communicate quickly as much as possible. Though Airbnb mostly seems to target hosts wrt this. If your guest completely ignores you, that seems to be ok with them.
Does that happen every time? And does refreshing not change that? If so, you should complain to Airbnb, because that’s not the way it is supposed to work.
I pre-approved inquiries a few times when I first started, but quickly realised it didn’t make sense. Most of the time an inquiry means nothing and is best ignored, after an initial response. If the guest is serious it should be apparent fairly quickly, and he/she will get back to you soon enough with a booking request. But in general that’s very much the exception.
And I may never have declined an inquiry. If I have, I’ve forgotten about it.
1 Like
Yes, it always happens this way. I did complain to Airbnb about this last year and got no response. I reported it as a glich and heard nothing back and nothing has changed.