- Save valuable time, we take care of everything
- Increase your occupancy rate and your income
- Provide a 5-star experience for your guests
- Hassle-free: full management, from check-ins to cleaning
Renting out your vacation home involves good organization and back-to-back stays. But what should you do when you don't feel comfortable with a guest? How do you decline a booking? Do these refusals impact your listing's search ranking? Your Welkeys bnb concierge service answers these questions today.
Responding to booking requests
When you list your property, you first have a choice regarding booking requests. You can enable "Instant Book" or disable this setting by clicking "Manage listing." If you choose the former, all booking requests are automatically accepted by default, so no prior approval is required. The latter option, however, gives you more freedom, though you must still adhere to certain timeframes.
Once you receive a booking request, you have 24 hours to accept or decline it. If no decision is made within that time, the request expires. Note that during this period, no other traveler can attempt to book your property. It is advisable to set up alerts so you don't miss any requests and can be as responsive as possible. Also, keep in mind that once a request expires, the dates remain blocked, so stay vigilant! To unblock these dates, you must go to your calendar and make the necessary changes. If you regret missing an expired request, you can send a special offer to the guest in question.
If a lack of information about a potential guest makes you hesitant to accept a booking request, we recommend communicating with them on the platform. Since some travelers provide very little information on their profiles, it is not uncommon for hosts to ask for the purpose of their stay or a short introduction via message. To help you make your decision, you can also check reviews left by other owners about the guest who made the request. These are often deciding factors!
Declining booking requests: what is the impact on your listing?
It is perfectly legitimate to wonder what impact declining bookings might have on your listing's search ranking. Rest assured, if they remain rare, refusals do not have negative consequences for you or your visibility. However, if you do it too frequently, your ranking in search results may be penalized. The same applies to booking cancellations! If you cancel more than three stays in a single year, your listing may be deactivated by Airbnb.
To stay in the good graces of the popular booking platform, it is best to meet the following criteria:
- have an overall rating of at least 4.8/5have a response rate to booking requests of at least 90%have a cancellation rate of 1% or lesshave hosted guests 10 times or accepted 3 bookings for a total of at least 100 days
If you manage to meet all these criteria, you will be granted Superhost status!
Welkeys supports you in managing your rental
Are you renting out your property for short-term stays but lack the time to handle the resulting logistics? At Welkeys, we support you and manage the entire rental process for you, from creating your listing to welcoming guests and handling cleaning. We also help you manage your calendar and maintain good visibility on booking platforms.
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