Airbnb cracks down further on ‘disruptive parties’ with new booking filters

Under 25s and certain dates blocked to prevent ‘disruptive’ parties

Airbnb is one of the world’s biggest rentals booking websites

Holiday rentals website Airbnb is launching ‘high risk reservation’ technology in a bid to crack down on large, disruptive parties in its properties.

The UK arm of the digital brand says the improvements to its booking platform will block big groups and renters who are likely to hold ‘disruptive parties’ and other antisocial gatherings in an Airbnb.

It does this by taking into account certain dates in the calendar, as well as the age of the user and duration of the booking.

A year ago the platform introduced a restriction that blocks users under 25 years old without a history of positive reviews from booking certain rentals - a measure the new booking filters aim to build on.

Airbnb says this restriction has already blocked reservation attempts from nearly 375,000 would-be partiers across the UK, France and Spain.

“There are thousands of stays taking place across the UK each night, with the overwhelming majority being respectful of neighbours and delivering benefits to the local community,” said Amanda Cupples, general manager of Northern Europe at Airbnb.

“These measures to help block certain reservations build on our efforts to reinforce our global ban on disruptive parties, and will help us attempt to stop those that are set on breaking the rules.”

In August 2020 the website announced a ‘global party ban’, introducing rules which capped groups at 16 and prohibiting ‘all disruptive parties and events’ of any size.

Anyone who breaks the rules can be suspended or expelled from the rentals platform, as can hosts that are found to have allowed the party.

In the US, Fox News recently reported that Airbnb would be shutting down Halloween parties in its rentals by blocking one-night reservations on 31 October.

Among general reports of neighbourhood disturbances around the world, the rentals company had introduced the global party ban after a mass shooting at a Halloween party held in an Airbnb in San Francisco in 2019.