Post by High Priestess on Oct 2, 2015 21:25:43 GMT
When you are contacted by a prospective guest on AIrbnb, they will either send you an INQUIRY (it will be labelled as an inquiry in your inbox, in yellow letters) or a RESERVATION REQUEST (which will read "pending" in your inbox). You will be responding differently to these two.
(1) If sent an INQUIRY, you need to respond to them with a message within 24 hours to maintain your 100% response rate. If you respond later than that, your response rate will take a hit. IN your response, you want to ask them any questions you need to ask and start to do your screening. Ask them to fill out their profile if they haven't done that yet, add a photo if they haven't got one yet. Ask them their purpose for visiting your area and whether they have read and understand your house rules. If you decide,after some back and forth, that you want to allow them to book, you can send them a preapproval or a special offer. TO send a special offer, click on preapproval, and the option to send a special offer should show up. You do not need to send a preapproval or a decline to every inquiry. Simply sending a message is all you are required to do.
You need not officially decline an inquiry, but you can do so if you like just to clarify to the guest that the space is not avaiable to them. You need not state why you are declining, and we recommend that you say something vague such as "the space isn't available for the dates you want" or "I dont think it would be a good fit" as this avoids hurt feelings and also can avoid lawsuits, such as you could expose yourself to if you make a discriminatory statement and someone sue-happy decides to sue you on that basis.
(2) If sent a RESERVATION REQUEST, you need to either ACCEPT Or DECLINE within 24 hrs. there are no other choices. So, if someone sends a reservation request and has not told you enough about themselves, and you ask for more and then they do not respond in a timely way, you need to give them a deadline by which time you either need a response or you will decline their request. You might say, "IF I dont hear from you by 8pm on Wednesday, I will have to decline your request, but you can send me another request after you have answered my questions."
(1) If sent an INQUIRY, you need to respond to them with a message within 24 hours to maintain your 100% response rate. If you respond later than that, your response rate will take a hit. IN your response, you want to ask them any questions you need to ask and start to do your screening. Ask them to fill out their profile if they haven't done that yet, add a photo if they haven't got one yet. Ask them their purpose for visiting your area and whether they have read and understand your house rules. If you decide,after some back and forth, that you want to allow them to book, you can send them a preapproval or a special offer. TO send a special offer, click on preapproval, and the option to send a special offer should show up. You do not need to send a preapproval or a decline to every inquiry. Simply sending a message is all you are required to do.
You need not officially decline an inquiry, but you can do so if you like just to clarify to the guest that the space is not avaiable to them. You need not state why you are declining, and we recommend that you say something vague such as "the space isn't available for the dates you want" or "I dont think it would be a good fit" as this avoids hurt feelings and also can avoid lawsuits, such as you could expose yourself to if you make a discriminatory statement and someone sue-happy decides to sue you on that basis.
(2) If sent a RESERVATION REQUEST, you need to either ACCEPT Or DECLINE within 24 hrs. there are no other choices. So, if someone sends a reservation request and has not told you enough about themselves, and you ask for more and then they do not respond in a timely way, you need to give them a deadline by which time you either need a response or you will decline their request. You might say, "IF I dont hear from you by 8pm on Wednesday, I will have to decline your request, but you can send me another request after you have answered my questions."