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I beleive the reason for this is because of scammers out there that want to exploit vournabilty of the system. I think booking.com became so big in all those years, that they implemented some preventive measures for scams such as stealing identities, listing "fake" properties etc..
As far as I know new listings do have some restrictions such as you described. I am not sure, but I think you are able to select under the fine print or under the policies that deposit is required before arrival?
If this feature is not available I guess you'll have to accept only cash for some "short" period of time before all the features will be available to you. It's the proccedure that we need to accept if we want to host on BDC.
If you have a BDC account manager I suggest to contact the manager, sometimes they are able to pull some strings.
Guests on AirBnB, Homeaway are different type of guests in general comparing to "hotel" guests (BDC, Expedia, HRS,...). I always stated that there is a difference between hotel based platforms and home based platforms so the comparisment is not quite on point.
I think that property descriptions and rules on BDC are well presented, the problem is that some guests just don't pay enough attention, don't read well, are in a hurry,.. as Adamopolou stated.
, For example, we don't accept children under 12yr. Our property is marked as "Adults only", which is also clearly visible in general description of the property. On the time of booking each guest is automaticly notified (message template) about our children policy and max occupancy and yet some still arrive with their babies or young children. We don't accept them when they arrive. I am certain that those guests will be more carefull and read the description of the property next time when they are going to look for places.
But if you want to receive payments from Booking.com you need to activate "Payments by Booking.com" or "Online payments by BDC" (you need a POS machine).
I think this is not possible. Don't forget that Booking.com is hotel based platfrom, AirBnB is home based platform. So you'll see many different features on each platform.
M Adamopoulou, those are really great tips.
I would perhaps add that white sheets, white linen and white towels is definitily more recommended since it is well known that white laundry is more hygienic because you can wash them on a high temperature (90˙C), killing bacterias etc.. with the colored ones you basicly can't do that.
If you send them an email (or a message through extranet), they will see it, because they receive it on their personal email address and on their phone if they use an app.. It's the same proccedure as letting them know if they forgot something in the room after they already checked-out. The same way you let them know about the score. Some will ignore your message some won't. But at least you tried. Score can always be removed/modfied if requested by the guest.
Basicly we are just repeating ourselves. The point is, contact the guest directly about the score, and ask them politely to modify the score.. If they will - great.. if not... move on.
You can send this answer as a reply to their review (which is a nice reply for future guests that read those) and also as a private message directly to the booker via their BDC email address. If they left their phone number on the time of booking, you can even send them an SMS.
Most guests will read and will respond. Specially if they really enjoyed their stay at your property.
At least you can do is to try motivate the guest to modify their score.
A good example to respond to such scores:
"Dear Mrs./Mr.
Thank you for your kind score and your nice comment. We were very surprised to see that you scored all categories with 10, but overall you gave us 4 points out of 10. If there is some misunderstanding, we would like to ask you to overview your score (make a correction) or if on the other hand something wasn't all right in our property, please let us know, so we can arrange it better for our guests.
Thank you for your kindness
Best wishes,"