Cancellations should be avoided — they disrupt guest’s trips and there are significant penalties imposed by Airbnb and Vrbo partners. You should only cancel a guest reservation if the home is not suitable for guests, for example a major maintenance issue or a natural disaster.

Airbnb and Vrbo charge a penalty fee for cancellations initiated by the host and that is deducted from your next payout. Certain channels will also block your calendar for the dates you cancelled. Which prevents you from accepting new bookings for those dates. Canceling guest reservations can also negatively affect your listing’s ranking. In certain circumstances you can get these penalties waived.

See below for how to cancel and the fees and consequences you should expect.

To avoid cancelling guest reservations, use the Fairly Calendar tab to block dates or make personal reservations far in advance. You can learn more about how to do this here.

If a guest asks you to cancel a reservation, we recommend asking the guest to cancel the reservation themselves so you do not incur any repercussions.

First, on the Calendar page add a “block” to the dates where the home is not available. (You can learn more about how to do this here.) That way no other guests will be able to make a new booking for those dates.

Next, cancel the guest’s reservation by navigating to the Calendar tab and selecting the guest reservation. Select “Cancel reservation” in the right hand panel. You can also initiate a cancellation from the Messaging tab by selecting the guest conversation and then selecting “Cancel reservation” in the right hand panel. You’ll be taken through a series of steps and be informed of the estimated penalties. Keep in mind you can not undo this action.

Canceling a guest’s reservation will automatically refund their rent and fees back to the guest.

For Airbnb reservations that need to be cancelled with less than 24 hours before check-in, you must contact Fairly to cancel on your behalf. Email us at [email protected] and provide the following information.

You will be asked to provide a reason for the cancellation which helps the channel partners understand the circumstances and is required by Airbnb and Vrbo.

You are required to provide a message to the guest on why you are cancelling the reservation. Guests will receive this message on the platform where they booked the reservation. You can also see this message in the Messaging tab. Guests may also receive an email from the platform where they booked.

The minimum cancellation fee is $50 imposed by the channels. Often it will be much higher and is based on the reservation amount and when the reservation is canceled:

There is no limit or maximum on the cancellation fees.

Airbnb will automatically block your calendar from receiving new bookings for the dates you cancelled. You should manually add a block to your calendar on Fairly to avoid Vrbo guests from booking the home.

Vrbo will suspend your listing for 7 days. This means you won’t receive any new reservations for any dates in the future during that suspension.

Repeated cancellations can cause your listing to be suspended or removed by the channels. It also impacts where your listing shows up in rankings to guests and Superhost status could be lost.

If you believe the cancellation fees should be waived for extenuating circumstances, reach out to us ASAP at [email protected].

Provide the following information in your email:

We’ll follow up with after we’ve reviewed your email.