Connecting Airbnb iCal with WebBookingPro as calendar-based channel

[wph_info bg_color="#c0e62c" text_color="#000000"]This article will walk you through the entire process of mapping your rooms to your Airbnb rooms (and vice versa). Once you have completed all of the steps below, the system will update Airbnb with your availability, and the channel manager will download your Airbnb bookings into your bookings page in your system.[/wph_info]

[wph_warning bg_color="#eb7c7c" text_color="#000000"]Airbnb (iCal) is a calendar-based channel, which works differently than normal distribution channels. For example, only availability can be updated, no rates or any other stay restrictions.[/wph_warning]

  1. Airbnb iCal connection only supports the following:
    • Availability updates
    • Booking Downloads
    • Automatic Adjustments
  2. Airbnb iCal connection does not support rates.  You must enter rates directly into the channel's extranet.
  3. Airbnb iCal connection supports cancellations but be careful. If you receive an Airbnb cancellation, please check if you have received Cancellation notice from WebBookingPro within 15 minutes.
  4. Because of how the calendar URL system is designed, Airbnb iCal is only able to connect to one of the rooms of a WebBookingPro room type at a time.
  5. Make sure to disable Airbnb instant booking: Airbnb iCal pulls availability data from WebBookingPro every hour. Because of this, we recommend turning off "Instant Booking" when using Airbnb. When Instant Booking is turned off, the property is always asked to "confirm" the booking. Since the property has the opportunity to verify that the requested room is still available, unexpected bookings can more easily be prevented. This also allows you to check the guest's reviews and make sure they are a good fit for your property
  6. Reservations from Airbnb (iCal connection) does not contain any guest specific information, including guest’s name.
  7. The iCal calendar sync description for reservations display only the last 4 digits of the guest phone number, along with a link to the reservation details page
  8. The guest’s name and contact information do not appear on event titles, and the calendar sync export listing calendar information for future dates only

Connection Guide

  1. Access your WebBookingPro account and go to the "Channel Manager" from the left menu
  2. Click on "Add New"
  3. Search for Airbnb in the list of channels and click on Create

4. Now click on "Map Rooms" under AirBnB line.

5. For each room copy from WebBookingPro a calendar link.

6. Now Login to your Airbnb Account

If you already have an Airbnb account, click here to access it: www.airbnb.com

  1. Click on Host
  2. Click on Listings

  1. Click on the first listing's name that you would like to synchronize

  1. On this page, click on Availability tab then Scroll down up to Sync calendars section and select Import Calendar

  1. Paste the URL from step 7 above into your Airbnb Calendar Address (URL) field and give it a name
  2. Click on Import Calendar

  1. Obtain your Airbnb export calendar URL by clicking on Export Calendar

  1. Paste the Airbnb URL into the Exported calendar URL in WebBookingPro

Click Save Changes

  1. On the Airbnb side, click Sync Calendars for the room you have just set up listings for

Repeat the steps above for ALL of your Airbnb rooms you'd like to sync with WebBookingPro.

On WebBookingPro, click Import once completed - Your channel is now live!

Considerations

Please take the following considerations in mind when working with a calendar channel such as Airbnb:

  1. Selling Dorm beds/rooms on Airbnb is not recommended
    • Calendar-based channels do not provide us with the number of customers that booked, so bookings for shared/dorm rooms will be imported as 1 bed by default, even though there could be more! It's safest to not update/sell dorm rooms on Airbnb.
  2. We highly recommend disabling Instant Book with Airbnb.
    • By disabling Instant Book, you will have the opportunity to confirm all bookings before you accept them. Otherwise, an overbooking situation is more likely to occur because they download the calendar files from us in hourly intervals.  To resolve this overbooking potential, we recommend that you turn off Instant Book by toggling the Instant Book lightning icon off.
  3. Only one unit can be sold per room type each night
    • As soon as a booking is made for a particular room type, that booking will block the room type from being available to anybody else on Airbnb.  Creating multiple listings for each room is not a solution because you cannot assign multiple channel listings to a single channel manager room.  At best, you can sell one unit of each room type per night on Airbnb.