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What you need to know about Risk-free Reservations

Hi everyone,

I'm the Product Marketing Manager here at Booking.com for the Risk-free Reservations program. We noticed a lot of conversations in the Community on the topic! So we gathered the top three most asked questions to answer here, in order to provide more clarity. We want to enable you to make the most of this program. 


How can you make sure that the payment is guaranteed?

In the event of a cancellation, Risk-free Reservations provides you with a full, risk-free experience if you allow us to resell the cancelled room nights. To do so we need continued availability for the corresponding rooms and a compelling price. This is the commitment we ask from your side to guarantee the payment.

Receiving your Risk-free Reservations, what is the process, timing and amount you can expect to get paid?

Process:

The majority of guests that book flexible policies don’t actually end up cancelling, so in most cases you’ll be able to handle payment as normal, charging the guest once they are liable according to the policy terms. 

If the guest cancels outside the free-cancellation window and their means of payment is invalid, you mark this in the system as per usual and we’ll search for a replacement booking. If we are unable to find a new guest for those reservations we’ll still pay you for the room nights according to the payment solution you have signed up for. 

If a guest doesn’t show up on the day of arrival and again has not provided valid payment details, we will pay you straight-away as there is no time to find a new guest. 

Booking.com will only pay out for the room nights we were unable to find a replacement for and when the guest who cancelled is liable but fails to provide a valid means of payment. 

Timing:

 If we fail to replace the full reservation we’ll pay for the loss on the day of check-in.

Amount:

We will pay you the amount that was expected from the unfilled room nights in the original booking.

What are the benefits of Risk-free Reservations?

One of the top selling points for Booking.com guests is having the option of free cancellation. With Risk-free Reservations you’ll be able to attract those guests by adding more flexibility to your existing cancellations policies, with the guarantee of a risk-free experience. Adding more flexibility will boost your conversion and help you secure bookings quicker.

How can you join Risk-free Reservations? 

To join Risk-free Reservations you need to be a part of Payments by Booking.com. We use this solution to ensure your payment. If you have ticked all the criteria we will enroll you for this feature and confirm via an Extranet inbox message and/or an additional email. You can also enable/disable it here if you’ve not been automatically enrolled or your business strategy changes.

For more answers to frequently asked questions visit our FAQ Help article

We'd love to hear your feedback in the comments below. 


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fluff 4 years ago

Thanks for the clarification on this feature.

With regards to "and a compelling price" what is the minimum compulsion we need to offer?

This could be a usable feature to soften the no-refund-only policy we have had to employ due to rampant cancellations and no-shows in the past.

BUT

Is it possible to have this made more flexible i.e. we don't wish to be part of the Payments  by BDC scheme, with payments being as late as 6 weeks after check out a small business finds this a cash-flow problem.

I guess this would require a Payments by BDC solely for this setting/rate, on the immediate basis as quoted.

If that is possible we would use it.

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Bert - PMM Ris… 4 years ago

Thanks for your comment fluff.

By "Compelling price" I mean that for the same price you get extended features.

Regarding your suggestion, it's something we will think about, thanks for your feedback.

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Samke Khumalo Dludla 1 year ago

I need help regarding payment that is due to me on 24 March 2022. I hv not received payment. I need the money 

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pibomarco 4 years ago

Till what time (on the arrival date) we must keep the room available for Booking.com to find a replacement? 

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Bert - PMM Ris… 4 years ago

Hi pibomarco, thanks for your question.

B.com would look for a replacement until the guest check-in date and pay out to the partner otherwise. In the meantime, partners can remove the inventory. However, by doing that would make it not liable for replacement.

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pibomarco 4 years ago

Meaning that on the check-in date we can close the availabilty at anytime and the payout to the partner will be issued (if replacment was not found before the check-in date)?

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Bert - PMM Ris… 4 years ago

Hi pibomarco,

We will check for a reallocation until 2pm (hotel time) and then payout if we are unable to find one. That means that ideally you can't close the availability until 2pm hotel time for that day check-in.

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Glider City Mo… 4 years ago

I can't see how BDC can actually target a particular room that has been cancelled at a property - as you reason above. It's too hard from the availability point of view. All our rooms are basically the same with 1 queen and 1 single in them, yet we have to 'name' them as 'single', 'double', 'twin', 'family' etc so that the general public can (possibly) work out what they require. There should be something written somewhere, where bookers are told what the varying terms are for different room set ups. Because for us we have 10 rooms all the same and we have to have 2 singles, 2 doubles, 2 twins etc showing purely for the 'names' potential bookers see 'only 1 left' which is simply incorrect and I've been trying to work it out for probably around 8 years to be easier for me. Sometimes we win because a single will have to book a twin, but it's just not working well for me at all :-(  For one reason I feel like we are ripping people off because they are paying too much. But in another way, well... they should call direct.  We are only a 13 room property so it's very annoying when people see 'sold' on a room type where we only have ONE of a particular room type. :-( Cheers 

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Ara ibasco 2 years ago

Hi sir... Just want to clarrify booking just message me and that my invoice disappeared how come it was lost? How is my money? Where is my invoice.. Issually im receivibg invoice every 3rd day of the month and get my payout tru my bank on the 6th.. dont know whereelse to find money in times like this pandemic is troubling the world.. Hoping that booking will do something in this situation

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BrookAve 2 years ago

 

What are you doing replying to an ancient 12++ month old topic that is not even related to what you are talking about?

 

Instead make your own .

 

and FYI ,you cannot post action requests on the Partner Hub, you must open a case with Bdc Partner Support instead.

No one here can assist with invoice queries.

 

 

Message or Call BdC PartnerSupport ***

 

  1. In the extranet, go to the ‘Inbox’ tab.
  2. Select ‘Booking.com messages’.
  3. Right Pane - Click on ‘See Contact Options’
  4. Choose Account
  5. Now choose Other
  6. Then at bottom , See all contact options, and click Message or Call
  7. As there is no one number for all partners, the number for your nearest BdC Partner Support is then revealed.
  8.  

    *** public main lines via Where you can reach us

     

     


    how to contact partner support via private assigned number in inbox

 

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Ara ibasco 2 years ago

Hi sir... Just want to clarrify booking just message me and that my invoice disappeared how come it was lost? How is my money? Where is my invoice.. Issually im receivibg invoice every 3rd day of the month and get my payout tru my bank on the 6th.. dont know whereelse to find money in times like this pandemic is troubling the world.. Hoping that booking will do something in this situation

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emmanuella akande 1 year ago

I had a 10 day  reservation cancelled by booking dot com.  I tot it was with the risk free program. But the customer service did not know about this.   The reason for cancellation by booking dot com was that the guest has not paid.   I this was reserved start of august and cancelled 2 days to check in by booking dot com.  No effort was made to find another or replace.  I ended up losing 4 nights as I got 2 seperate 3 nights booking with last minute discounts. 

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Bandara Hotels… 4 years ago

Bert - PMM Risk Free Reservations  Thank you for your clarify and the Risk Free program is very good concept. And this make Booking.com be unique than other agent.

But the problem we have that cause deactivate this program is about room availability. When the hotel sold out the room type that guest booked. Booking.com cannot find the replacement booking for us as we already close the room. And hotel cannot earn money from that Risk free booking once they cancelled.

 

We understand that you need the hotel to keep open room for sell so you can find replacement booking for us, but if the hotel is really full, how can we keep room open.

 

My suggestion is If we can setup separate Guarantee Allotment for Risk free booking, I think this will help. So the hotel will know exactly how many booking under this program for make us control allotment easier. And make sure that all room will be sold and earn money. And hotel can still close sell the room (standard allotment) once they need.

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Hotel Everest 4 years ago

Good Evening,

I had a problem with the Risk Free Reservation.Please explain

There was a risk free booking for one night check-in on the 24/09/2019 and the guest had cancelled the booking many days back. Booking.com was looking for another guest but did not find any. On the day of the check-in booking.com at 14:00 hrs sent me a cancellation mail and I could charge the virtual card for this reservation.So now since the reservation was cancelled I had this room available for sale and so I opened my availability for that only one room which I had. Later on that day in a few hour I received 2 normal reservation from booking.com. So now Ii was over booked. How was this possible.Why was there 2 room available for sale if I had just undated one room for sale?

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pibomarco 4 years ago

I think that the problem is, because you opened availabilty. You are allowed to close the availabilty after 14pm for canceled risk free bookings. I guess booking.com can still accept bookings during the check-in hours and search for a "replacment" if you haven't closed availabilty. 

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Bandara Hotels… 4 years ago

Yes this is one of the weak point of this program, which cannot close sell and it will cause overbooking.

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Glider City Mo… 2 years ago

I think it's ok on the guarantee of receiving the money for the booking.  Having it online again is a double dip I guess.  It is a problem if it causes overbooking though :-( 

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罗重 4 years ago

我是罗重,有人冒充我的身份,我的电话***.请联系我

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Bandara Hotels… 4 years ago

Please write in English so every can understand and help you. Thank you.

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Isle of Wight … 4 years ago

I had a booking marked as Risk Free - the guest cancelled 15 minutes later. The amount shown then changed to £0. I understood that as it was Risk Free, we would still get paid. But then the dates for that booking came and went, and then I noticed that the booking had been marked to show that we had given permission for cancellation fees to be waived - we certainly did not do that.

So beware .... a guarantee from Booking.com is not necessarily a guarantee ....

 

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The Boat Yard 4 years ago

I'm having a nightmare with booking. Com, involving,, 4 cancelled risk free bookings,, over Christmas that ad up too a thousand pounds or more.. When booking. Com, resell  and then the guest cancels again there system doesn't seam to recognise this,, and states too be paid I must keep dates open, I haven't closed any dates,, booking. Com is the only ones closing dates,,  the payments are far more risk free,, when I deel with the money,,like with my other properties,, I have a strict cancellation policy,, booking. Com risk free, is a con as far as I'm concerned,, Janice, owner of smugglers rest,, Northam devon 

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Glider City Mo… 2 years ago

I don't really see it as risk free at all. I would rather just put my room up again. I usually leave the booking in my system and if they sell it again, well, well and good. They're just trying to keep the reservation dollars that came with that booking. It's usually for ones made more than a week out. Our cancellation pollicy is 7 days, as I was sick of having cancellations within the 48hours we previously had as our cancellation period

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Glider City Mo… 4 years ago

Hi there.

That is the exact problem I had a few weeks ago - no show and invalid card but said he'd cancelled 2 days earlier, which was within our 7 day cancellation period. So I actually wondered if the 'risk free' was actually referring for me the property owner, or the booking.com customer as it seemed to be all a bit 'one way' for bdc. Anyway, I phoned dbc and they ADVISED to mark as a no-show BUT DID NOT mention to mark it as fees not waived. Hence my earlier comment about not having a specific area for mentioning of this point. Therefore I lost out on the booking amount. The person on the phone just keep on and on and on about that I won't have to pay commission! I said 'what about the $180 I didn't get?' :-(  He just continued on about the commission. That's the reason why we have a 7 day cancellation policy and not 48 hours, especially if somebody were to cancel a 4 day booking 2 days out from check-in. :-(  (which has been known to happen previously). 

I'm still to check out how the payments work, but assuming it should be part of the commission invoice and show up as a credit amount.  That being said I COULD NOT find any 'help' on risk frees. Cheers :-) 

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Boquete Apartments 2 years ago

Not at all. BDC even lies to their partners and gaslight them without shame.
Our cancelation conditions say the guest needs to pay 30% if they cancel less than 30 days before arrival and full price if they don't show or cancel on the day of arrival, but BDC claims that a certain reservation where the guest canceled at 4 p.m. of the arrival day had the policy to "cancel free of charge at any time". Our extranet shows clearly the opposite, but BDC insists.
That's fraudulent. We are effing angry with this company. Either some of their employees need to be fired for incompetence or the entire company is a fraud.

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Brixtony1 4 years ago

Hi

 

If you have  a grace period for canellations (within 24hrs for example) after they are made then this I think  overrides the risk free element of the booking and is displayed that you gave permission to cancel the fees(as this is the policy you have set).

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Anonymous
4 years ago

Thanks for your question Isle of Wight VacationsBrixtony1's answer is correct. When you allow a grace period after a cancellation, (e.g. 24 hours free cancellations for any booking happening at your property) risk-free does not apply up until the period of the grace period has ended. Just like Brixtony1 is stating in the comment above, ‘this is overwriting the policy’ since you do give a free cancellation option yourself. If the customers cancellation happens after the grace period, we would apply all rules for a Risk-Free reservation.

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M Adamopoulou 4 years ago

Thanks Sergei for your above comment giving us more definitions about Risk free reservations.

My last risk free reservation was canceled 4 days before arrival....

BDC informed me that I would be paid but it will take a little longer...

In my finance tab I have a notice that payment is issued on Nov. 12th....so I guess my bank account will be credited in a short while..

Wish you all a wonderful weekend!!!

 

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Sharonpowney 4 years ago

I had a cancelled reservation recently and as I am on risk free reservations I expected to be paid.  Having read the thread here I realised I would be short a day as I need advanced notice for a new booking, but that seemed fair.  But NO payment.  Having emailed the finance team this is what they said "We do not apply risk free for all of the bookings, but launch it randomly.  Unfortunately this reservation is not one of them."  Struggling to come up with a polite response so thought I would post here and try and get a response from Bert as the expert.  There is nothing in the information above that says anything like this.  Why am I in a scheme that I have no control over it being applied "randomly"!!

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Brixtony1 4 years ago

Hi All

We are having issues with how risk free bookings are displayed on the listings. 

They show this. "

FREE cancellation before 17 Jan 2020 

NO PREPAYMENT NEEDED - pay at the property"

This does not suit us as we offer self service check-in and our guests love the flexibility. Can it not just say 

NO PREPAYMENT NEEDED - pay on arrival day 

 

We can then debit the card on arrival day as usual?

 

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Isle of Wight … 4 years ago

Not sure why you would want to do this - your property will get loads of bookings, the calendar will be blocked, and guests won't show up and you won't earn any money .... this is a well known problem with Booking.com and not taking payment at the time of booking .....

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M Adamopoulou 4 years ago

Dear Partner, I think you have to change your Policies to very flexible.

Hope this helps.

 

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Brixtony1 4 years ago

Thanks

 

That doesn't change how risk free bookings are displayed to guests. It still says "pay at the property"

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Community Admin 4 years ago

Hi Brixtony1  ! Thanks for posting in the Community! 

The "Pay at the property" message appears not only in case of Risk-free reservations, but in any case where offered free cancellation with no prepayment and payments are handled directly by you. 

You still can debit the guests credit card upon arrival, if it suits both you and the guest. 

Good luck!

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BrookAve 4 years ago

Hi

Please finish/update your profile to include link to your property so we can see it.

 


Do you have Payments by Booking.com enabled?

 

Check under Finance> Getting Paid


Then under that heading you should see this is it is enabled.


get paid by bdc

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

I have a scenario that no one at the call centre could clarify. I spent 90 mins on the phone to various agents this afternoon.

 

Background: I am based in South Africa. Legislation precludes me from processing guest cards myself. I have to request that the guest makes the payment themselves and I have to send them a card payment link. My current payment policy is 100% payment on booking in the 30 days prior to arrival. ie if the guest doesn't pay on booking, I can cancel at 24 hours after booking and then I usually find a replacement booking.

 

Here are the risk free reservation scenarios for clarification by booking.com: 

Scenario 1:


Guest books, doesn't pay due to the flexible cancellation policy. Free cancellation period expires 4 days prior to check in. I request the guest to make payment. Card payment fails. I wait 24 hours and cancel the booking. It is highly unlikely at short notice that I will find a replacement guest. If booking.com doesn't cover this scenario then I've just blocked off a room for a long period of time for a booking that results in nothing. Given the number of card payment failures in South Africa, this is a significantly more common scenario than a cancellation. 



Will booking.com cover this or am I out of pocket?



Scenario 2:


Guest books, doesn't pay due to the flexible cancellation policy. Guest decides they don't want the room. They don't bother to cancel. Free cancellation period expires 4 days prior to check in. I request the guest to make payment. They ignore me and are a no-show.



Will booking.com cover this or am I out of pocket?



If Scenario 1 and 2 result in me being out of pocket, then this is not risk free at all, as there are as many more cases in my experience where guests just don't bother to advise that they are not coming or where payment fails, as cases where they actually cancel. 



I have opted out of this because I am not sure of booking.com's policy in these cases. If I will be out of pocket, then this is a program that not only not work for me, but will actually cause my revenue to drop. I hope that isn't the case as the idea behind the program is quite good. 

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BrookAve 4 years ago

Simple solution is let BdC take the prepayment on a non Refundable rate, with cancellation only allowed in first 24 hours.

 

Enable payments by BdC

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

Hi Barry, I would hope that is what they do, since that is how my policies are configured, however it isn't explicitly stated anywhere that I can see for these risk free reservations, that they are actually indeed doing this, and no one is willing to confirm anything at the call centre. My understanding, after some comms with the guest is that nothing has been collected/authorised/held from her credit card. And when I pressed the multiple agents (I phoned the call centre about 4 times today) to ask them to explain/confirm/clarify the scenarios I outlined above, absolutely none of them seemed to grasp the nuances of my concerns whatsoever and couldn't help me clarify the points above at all in the slightest. So I'm at a loss. Unless they can offer the solution you suggest and are willing to state that in writing up front, I can't make use of this program of theirs.

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BrookAve 4 years ago

Hi

So these are two things with part 1 is switch to non Refundable rates today, decide when or if you allow cancellation and enable payments by BdC.

 

Part2

Risk Free

All this is, an algorithm that sees our offering with non Refundable enabled, and offers an independent risk free offer to the guest to have the option to cancel. The beauty of this is, when guest cancels, BdC system then finds guests searching for some or overlapping dates,  offers them the listing.

 

Now let's say that 2nd guest only chooses 2 of the original dates, they then prepay for those 2 nights and BdC pay you the 3rd.

 

Another is when no alternative guest is found, BdC will then pay you for the original booking cost.

 

It's a win-win. I do it.

 

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

Hi Barry,

I really appreciate you taking the time to help me here. I'm not sure if I'm being thick or what but I'm not convinced that I understand this correctly.

Let's say I have a non refundable rate + risk free reservations + payment by BdC. The guest then books. What happens at that point (on booking)? Does BdC take the money from the guest or not? Meaning that (1) if the guest cancels, then BdC returns the guest money and further guarantees the booking? And (2) if the guest doesn't cancel then no scenario exists after the free cancellation period where a guest would still need to pay?

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The Boat Yard 4 years ago

Basically, I think booking. Com, collects there payments and holds the money til they cancel, and that earns booking. Com a hefty amount in interest with millions paid like this often six months in advance,, and thats why they, can offer as an insentive to cover the cancellation s,, but,, be careful,, because,, when you deel with payment it's in your pocket and guaranteed,, bdc,, arnt always rely able,, with risk free,, iv found,,, asbestos iv been waiting now, for 12 days,,,, were booking. Com, have re sold the days with risk free, they have then been cancelled a second time,,, and now it says, restore availability, if you want booking. Com to continue to sell these nights..  So there is a flaw in the system 

 

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BrookAve 4 years ago

The literally answer is you get paid by BdC for both.

The rest you dont even need to think or consider, its literally that literal.

 

 

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

Thanks for that information. Have you experienced any scenario ever at your establishment where the guest still needed to pay after the free cancellation period ended? The message on my booking sheet says "after the free cancellation period, it is up to the establishment to get the money from the guest" (or similar, I'm paraphrasing). Yet I only have non-refundable policies on my system and I also have payment by BdC enabled. This is why I'm confused and concerned. 

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BrookAve 4 years ago

No that's literally impossible, cant happen.

But only, only if you enable payments by Booking.com, that force prepayment.

I.e. BdC force the guest to prepay, then pay out to you after checkout by bank transfer with in 2 to 10 days. Or 15th of the month if not every 9 days.

I usually do the 9 days then 48 hours later receive the funds.

 

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

Ah OK I understand. I think where I am getting confused, is that I don't seem to be able to find the option for BdC to do the payments. I have not found the "Payments by BdC" option (as per your screenshot above) on any menu item in the extranet. I do have virtual card payments enabled, but it appears guests can choose to either use virtual cards or their own credit card and the payment is made through the payment gateway I use, which is linked with my channel manager. There isn't a menu option where I can select for BdC to handle the entire payment for each and every booking. 

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BrookAve 4 years ago

It's under finance menu - Get Paid, I think.

 

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M Adamopoulou 4 years ago

Dear Partner,

I agree with Barry...

”The literally answer is you get paid by BdC for both.”

Last October I had a reservation non-refundable which was upgraded automatically to flexible reservation giving the guest the possibility to cancel 4 days before arrival. This because I have joined Non-risk reservations a year ago.

Reservation was canceled 4 days before arrival...

Next month my account was credited with the total amount of reservation.  Of course BDC facilitates my Payments.

You have to be eligible to join Payments by booking.com.  You can call your local BDC office and ask them if  BDC can facilitate payments for you.

Best wishes.

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The Flying Pen… 4 years ago

The payments by BdC isn't available on my menu system. A brief search online indicates that this option isn't available everywhere yet. @M Adamopoulou: I understand the concept of being paid out if a guest CANCELS. This is not my concern. My concern is if a guest does NOT cancel and then the payment fails in the short window of time during the 4 days preceding their arrival. Guest payments fail a lot in South Africa. Imagine a guest books my most expensive apartment for 3 weeks over peak season (ie when I would make my most revenue). It is a no risk reservation. They do not cancel. 4 days before arrival, the free cancellation period expires, I then try and charge the guest and their payment fails. Then what? I am about 100% sure booking.com will tell me "Oh, you are allowed to then cancel this booking after 24 hours of the guest not updating their card details. Please mark the card as invalid on the extranet". This is completely and utterly useless as I am then out of pocket for a massive booking with almost no time to find a replacement, which will then be my problem. It is that gap between the cancellation period expiry and arrival that is the problem. It means that a guest can effectively not pay, something I will only discover very close to arrival date, walk away and I am out of pocket. The way I have been operating thus far is to collect all payments well in advance of arrival date, so that if a guest doesn't pay, I have ample time to cancel and find a replacement. That option seems to be unavailable with risk free reservations. 

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pibomarco 4 years ago

If you are charging virtual cards I assume you activated "Online Payments by Booking.com"? Those are basicly guaranteed bookings and payments should not fail.


 

How virtual credit cards differ from regular credit cards
  • Virtual cards involve guaranteed payouts from Booking.com and don’t need to be pre-authorised or validated.
  • Virtual cards have an activation date tied to the reservation policy. Always make sure the card is active before you charge it.
  • If you get an error when trying to charge a virtual card, wait 30 minutes and go back to the 'Reservation details' page for information on what went wrong.
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M Adamopoulou 4 years ago

Sorry if I was misunderstood...theguestdidn’ cancel ...his credit card was had not there was an issue billing your debit/credit card...