If you are located in one of the biggest cities in the world like London fraudulent bookings can be a regular occurrence if you do not have the correct policies and measures in place. Within this blog we will give you our point of view and explain how to avoid potential fraudulent bookings placed on booking.com. Furthermore we explain what to do if you identify that you are a victim of a fraudulent act.

1. So you need to create policies in booking.com that are protecting you and your property. Do not allow people to book without submitting their credit card details especially the CVC code. With vague wording description your policy should allow you to opt to charge a higher deposit than the normal rate you have already submitted. You must reserve the right to refuse entry to the property if there are missing guests from the party upon arrival.

2. When you receive a booking the first thing to do is pre-authorise/charge the submitted card linked with the reservation. You can do this using Stripe, or other similar payment methods. If there is a problem with the pre-authorisation/payment the person needs to update the card details on booking.com, if they do not do this by 6pm on the same day you can cancel the reservation.

3. If the pre-authorisation or charging of the card is successful, call the person and let them know that there will be a self check-in process and ask them to provide you with their name and the names everyone else in the group. We want to make the guest assume that no one will be attending the property to meet them in person and check them in. If the booking is fraudulent the likelihood of them giving you artificial/fake names is really high.

4. Once they provide you with all of the names in writing, you need to let them know that actually you or another member of the check-in team will meet them at the location of the property booked. The person who booked the property must be present at the location and needs to provide his/her passport and the bankcard used to make the payment needs to be present and match the person’s name on the passport. Likewise, all members of the guest’s party need to be present at the location with their passports. Additionally, the passports need to match the names provided in writing earlier.

5. Majority of the time if the booking is fraudulent there will be excuses made that one person can only attend the check-in. If they try to give you excuses that 1 person will pick up the key, explain that you have a policy in place and the only way for them to get into the property is to follow exactly what is described above.

6. If they confirm that everything is satisfactory with the policy above and they attend the check-in and everything is matching as requested you have no need to worry. Make sure you have taken photos of their passports for security reasons and if the reservation is last minute we suggest increasing the deposit value by 300%. If you have pictures of their documents and have increased the deposit amount it is less likely that they will misbehave and cause damage to the property.

7. However, if your gut feeling still tells you that they are up to no good, you can use the excuse that there is a double booking and you are unable to accommodate them. However you should use that as a last resort option as if they will contact booking.com you will be charged for the price difference between your property and the new property booking.com will book on their behalf.

In order for all of the above to go smoothly and have the platform on your side, it’s essential and imperative for you to have the right policy in place on booking.com to prevent fraudulent bookings. For more information on Premium Airbnb London Property Management please contact us at contact@winwinnkeeper.net or visit our website www.winwinnkeeper.com Don’t forget to share the blog post and leave a comment below, we love hearing about your experiences