How to Connect Airbnb iCal with myallocator as calendar-based channel

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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.

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. Check the following article to learn more about calendar-based channels.

If you'd like to connect AirBnb trough API, you can refer to this article

Airbnb iCal Connection Limitations

As a part of Airbnb’s ongoing efforts to minimize exposure of guest information, Airbnb no longer displays certain guest information reservation details via their iCal feed.

Please check further information on this article: Airbnb iCal Announcement and Next Steps - December 2019

Airbnb iCal reservations are imported in myallocator only 1 year prior to check-in date. For example, if a guest booked 1 year and 11 days prior to check in date, you need to wait 11 days until the reservation could be imported in myallocator.

  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 does not support cancellations. If you receive an Airbnb cancellation, you must cancel the booking manually in your connected PMS / myallocator
  4. Because of how the calendar URL system is designed, Airbnb iCal is only able to connect to one of the rooms of a myallocator room type at a time.
  5. Make sure to disable Airbnb instant booking: Airbnb iCal pulls availability data from myallocator 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 myallocator account and go to the Manage tab
  2. Click on Channels
  3. Click on Add Channel
  4. Search for Airbnb iCal in the list of channels and click on Not Setup to start the mapping process.
  1. Check to Enable the channel
  2. Click Next to proceed
  1. Copy the calendar URL from myallocator

For Windows: "Ctrl-A" to select all and "Ctrl-C" to copy

For Mac: "Command-A" to select all and "Command-C" to copy

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 myallocator
  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 myallocator.

On myallocator, click Next once completed - Your channel is now live!

Refresh trough myallocator is not necessary for calendar based, as they get the updates from iCal servers directly

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.
Have more questions? Contact Support

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