Setting a listing booking policy: Instant book or Request to book

Policy options

Request to book policy allows you to add a verification step for your guests before they can book. Calendar dates are blocked for 24 hours until the request is accepted or declined.

Instant booking policy can benefit your Airbnb response rate, contribute to your listing ranking in Airbnb search results, and increase your chances of becoming an Airbnb super-host. In some cases, instant booking allows you to cancel an instant reservation without violating Airbnb’s cancellation policy.

Requirements and behavior

Regardless of your booking policy, a reservation is instantly approved when you pre-approve a guest’s inquiry. Also, there are cases when a reservation will always be received as a request to book. 

With both booking policies, you’ll need to connect your payment processor to Airbnb, and guests must add their payment details when they book.

When importing a listing from Airbnb, its approval policy is automatically set to instant booking.

When publishing a listing to Airbnb, you can choose your desired policy. 

You can change a connected listing's booking policy, whether it's imported, linked, reconnected, or published.

Set or change a booking policy

Follow the steps below to set or change the booking policy.

ֿStep by step

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the top navigation bar, click the mode selector and select Growth mode.
3. Click Distribution.
4. Click the Airbnb thumbnail.
5. In the integration page, click the relevant account.
6. Click the relevant listing.
7. In the left-side menu, click Pricing & Policies.
8. Select Reservation policies.
9. Scroll down to “Booking options” and click Edit.
10. Select instant or request to book. For “Instant”, you can add a welcome message for guests.
11. Click Save.

Limitations

• Only certain properties are eligible for request to book. Eligibility is determined by Booking.com according to the following criteria:
  • When the property was registered:
    • Properties created via API after September 2023
    • Properties created via join.booking.com in 2023 
  • The properties categorization:
    • In Booking.com: Holiday Home, Apartment, or Villas.
    • In Guesty: Apartment, Studio, Loft, Vacation Home, House, Villa, Condominium, Cabin, Townhouse, Bungalow, Hut, Castle, Holiday Home, or Cottage.
  • Other property types are not supported.
• Requests to book don't block calendar availability. If dates become unavailable before the guest confirms, the request may expire.
• Prices are subject to change between the request and confirmation. If the price changes, guests are notified and can choose whether to proceed.
• Request to book properties only appear in Booking.com search results if check-in is three or more days away. For last-minute reservations, with check-in within two days or less, only instant book properties are shown.

Enable request to book based on your connection type

The process for enabling request to book depends on whether your listing uses a rates and availability connection or a full sync connection.

Differentiating between a inquiry and Request To Book

Understanding the difference between a Vrbo Inquiry and a Request to Book ("Quote and Hold") is crucial for managing reservations correctly and responding to guests in a timely manner. Misinterpreting them can lead to penalties, overbookings, or missed opportunities.

• Inquiry
  • An inquiry means the guest asked a general question but didn't submit a formal booking request. 
  • An inquiry may contain dates, listing names, and the number of guests. An inquiry won't include a reservation number, confirmation code, or payment details, and won't create a block on your calendar. 
  • Respond to an inquiry within 24 hours to keep response metrics healthy. 
• Request to Book
  • The guest completed the booking process on Vrbo using "Quote and Hold" and created a reservation. 
  • A Request to Book displays a "Reserved" status and a valid confirmation code that begins with "HA-".
  • Accept or decline the reservation within 42 hours.

Use our quick identification guide below to differentiate between an inquiry and a Request to Book.

Policy options

You can apply an instant booking or a “quote and hold” policy (equivalent to request to book) to your listings. If you don't accept or decline a quote and hold a reservation within 42 hours, it's canceled automatically. 

Requirements and behavior

Vrbo charges a tiered partner fee when the host is responsible for a cancellation. Additional actions, such as a temporary listing suspension, may also be imposed. Exceptions to this policy can be made for cancellations outside the partner’s control. We therefore recommend using instant book for Vrbo listings.

When connecting a Vrbo account to Guesty, you can set the default booking policy as instant book or quote and hold.

When publishing a listing to Vrbo, you can select the account’s default policy or use the alternative.

Set or change a booking policy

Follow the steps below to set or change the booking policy after it is connected to Vrbo.

The update syncs to Vrbo within 24 hours. 

Step by step

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the top navigation bar, click the mode selector and select Growth mode.
3. Click Distribution.
4. Click the Vrbo thumbnail.
5. In the integration page, click the relevant account.
6. Click next to the relevant listing.
7. Select Instant booking or Non-instant booking (quote and hold).
8. Click Save.

Policy options

You can set an instant booking policy or request to book when creating a Guesty Booking Engine.

Requirements and behavior

With a request to book policy, guests are not required to enter their payment details. Additionally, with request to book, you can choose whether to block the calendar for booking requests for 24 hours indefinitely or not at all. Reservations are received in a “Reserved” status when the calendar is blocked and in “Inquiry” status when it's available. 

When you select an instant booking policy, reservations are automatically confirmed upon creation. Guests must provide credit card details during booking, but payment processing follows your listing's Auto Payment rules. This means the confirmation status operates independently from payment status.

Guests can use the following cards:

• Visa
• American Express
• UnionPay
• Discover
• Diner's club
• JCB
• Mastercard

The list of supported credit cards cannot be changed. To allow payments by credit card, connect Stripe or GuestyPay as your payment processor in Guesty. Once a reservation is made, its status is instantly changed to "Confirmed". The payment processing is done separately and does not affect the reservation's confirmed status. 

Beta users can set instant booking by bank transfer or payment apps. In this case, when a reservation is booked, its status automatically changes to Confirmed, and the payout status updates to “Payment failed”. Send payment instructions to your guests and collect their payment manually. Once payment is made, manually update the reservation payout status to “Fully paid”.

If you’re using message automations, differentiating between reservations paid via bank transfer and via credit card in message automations is not possible. Therefore, we recommend addressing both payment options in the content of your messages.

Set or change a booking policy

Follow the steps below to set or change the booking policy.

Step by step

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the top navigation bar, click the mode selector and select Growth mode. 
3. Click Distribution.
4. Click the Guesty Booking Engine thumbnail.
5. Click next to the relevant Booking Website, and select Edit Booking Engine.
6. Select Booking settings in the left sidebar.
7. Under “Select how guests book”, select Request to book or Instant booking from the dropdown menu. When selecting request to book, choose the relevant option under  “Affect on calendar”.
8. Click Save Booking Engine.

Refer to the information about Guesty Booking Engine to learn about the channel prerequisites and limitations. 

Set or change a booking policy

When creating a Booking Engine API instance, you set its booking policy.

Follow the steps below to set or change the booking policy.

Step by step

1. Sign in to your Guesty account.
2. In the top navigation bar, click the mode selector and select Growth mode. 
3. Click Distribution.
4. Click the Guesty Booking Engine API thumbnail.
5. To the right of the relevant API instance, click .
6. Select Edit API key.
7. Under “Booking options”, select Requests to book, Instant bookings, or Both. 

If you choose “Both”, the guest can decide which option to use. You can also code the booking engine to allow booking with or without a credit card token.

Guesty’s integrations with these channels only support instant booking. 

Guesty’s integrations with additional booking channels only support instant booking. The policy is automatically applied when connecting a listing between Guesty and the channel.