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I have more and more guest who send a message for pre-approval, and when I accept I am instantly redirected to a page that says the guest has a problem with his payment methods and has 24hours to fix this, the calendar being blocked in the meantime.
It is sometimes for same days bookings, and they can sometimes block weeks of calendar for 24 hours which is totally unacceptable.
For me, my calendar should only be blocked when a guest has paid. No payment no calendar blocked, so that a more serious guest can book.
You will find attached an illustration (in French) of the message when the situation last happened to me. In the end the guest did not fix his payment and blocked my listing for 24 hours, preventing other same days booking.
I agree it’s a drag, but that’s how Airbnb does it. I have read posts from hosts saying they phoned Airbnb and insisted they unblock the dates, especially if it was blocking a large number of dates, and were successful.
And you don’t have to be open to same-day bookings, you know. Those seem to be the most problematic in terms of payments going through. Sometimes the guest stays, only for the host to get a message from Airbnb saying they were unable to collect payment. This is one of the reasons i would never accept last-minute bookings. In fact, i have 3 day advance notice, because I want the payment to have time to go through.
As far as inquiries go, you don’t have to either pre-approve or decline- just messaging back within 24 hours fulfills your obligation. That way, it won’t block your calendar, and if the guest wants to book, they can then send a booking request.
I have done this. I called and told them to unblock the dates, they told me it was their policy to block the dates to give the guest a chance to pay. I told them it was MY policy not to block my calendar for unpaid reservations and for them to show me specifically where in the TOS this policy she spoke of.
