Self manage availability settings / Initial availability push / overwrite availabilities 🎥

• If "Save" button is used: settings take effect in 24 hours cycles - every night 00:00 hs. CET
  If "Overwrite availability" button is used: settings take effect immediately (a few minutes tops)
  
  
• This feature only works for dates (at least) 2 days in the future and will not open or close any previous dates. 

 

What does this feature do?

It adds availability to the properties and dates of your choice. For portals Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and Your Website (Smoobu Website or using Smoobu Booking System) - you are now able to self manage your availability from Smoobu. Even if you have entered prices for a property, you also need to add availability for a certain period of time to be bookable.

Depending on these settings Smoobu will overwrite your availability on channels. Please, ensure that your Smoobu bookings calendar is complete.

You might want to keep in mind that these settings will apply in the back-end but will not be shown as a blocked period on your Smoobu calendar. You can change or delete these settings any time from the section we are about to show you below.

2 options: Relative days or Fixed date

There's two ways to do this: a) Relative days or b) Fixed Date:

a) Relative days should be used to be bookable for (x) days starting from tomorrow. It is also referred to as Rolling Availability, as you choose a period of time you want to be bookable for (say, for the next 3 months from today's date) that 'rolls' on. You can set the 3 months as 2 days using the Option 1 method below.

To be used in an example: 'I want to take bookings only 3 months in advance, always from today's date'

b) Fixed Date should be used whenever you have a set end date in mind. When the end date nears, you can set a new end date. You can set this using Option 2 below.

To be used in an example: 'I want to take bookings only until the 1st of September'

How do I set it up?

Go to Calendar / Settings / Availability settings.

You can set a Default settings (applies to all units) or different values per individual accommodation (More accommodations).

Individual accommodation > Default

You can set a Default settings (applies to all units) or different values per individual accommodation (More accommodations).

Please note that if you configure this setting in both the Default and Individual accommodations options, the individual setting will always override the general setting.

For instance, see example below. For Airbnb there is a Default setting (Relative days = 360) and an Individual accommodation setting (Relative days = 365). The more specific setting overrides the default one, therefore 365 will be applied for Apt.5.

Option 1: Relative days

Set the time interval within which your guests can book in advance. Select a default amount of days for all accommodations or a different value per unit. All settings would apply from tomorrow onwards (no same night opening).
Smoobu will go through all portals every night, open the days within the defined period and close every date after that. We also call this function "rolling availabilities". 

Example

Today is 11/02/2020 and now, 10.25 am you set up your Availability settings - Relative days to 2 days for Booking.com.

Tonight, we will close every date open after 2 days (11/05/2020) to make sure you can't receive bookings after that date. 

The night after, we will open 1 more day. And the day after, another one. We'll always make sure you're bookable 2 days in advance. 

Option 2: Fixed date

Define what is the latest date you would like to be bookable. When you choose the 'Fixed date' option, a calendar will pop up for you to select the date. 

Example

Today is 14/04/2020 and that morning you set up your Availability settings - Fixed date to 21/12/2021 for Booking.com

Tonight, we will close every date open after 21/12/2021 to make sure you can't receive bookings after that date. 

Also you can define your availability settings per portal OR per portal and per accommodation. So you can further define availability per unit!

Initial availability push / forcing an availability update

In case it is the first time you define your availability settings for a portal / property, your listing could have previously closed dates. We recommend to force an availability update via the Overwrite availability button.

⚠️ Important: Please check if your Smoobu calendar is complete (all portals reservations, blocked periods and direct bookings are now in your Smoobu calendar).

How far in advance do the portals allow us to synchronise?

Booking.com: 2 years

Expedia: 18 months

Airbnb: 3 years

Removing these settings

If you wish to remove these settings from Smoobu and be bookable with no chosen end date, please remove the "Bookable until" / "Relative days" setting/s from Smoobu for the portal/s.