Airbnb has introduced a ban on one-night stays over New Year’s Eve here in the UK as part of its ‘anti-party’ stance.
The UK is among 11 countries where Airbnb has introduced the ban, which impacts certain users – with Ireland, Australia, Spain, France, Canada, Brazil, Portugal, the Netherlands, the US and New Zealand also seeing New Year’s parties prohibited.
New users and people with a bad account history on the online property booking platform will be unable to book an entire home for NYE.
“These restrictions will see a ban on one-night bookings of entire home listings for guests without a positive account history – or no previous bookings at all – on the platform,” an Airbnb statement said.
It’s not just one-night parties either. According to Airbnb, it’s also introducing tighter restrictions for guests who try to book two- and three-night reservations, especially if they’re trying to book locally to where they live.
During last year’s trial of the anti-party scheme, Airbnb says that “approximately 340,000 guests globally were blocked or redirected from attempting to book on Airbnb over NYE, including more than over 34,500 guests in the UK.”
The statement continued: “We are committed to reducing instances of unauthorised parties and helping hosts protect against neighbourhood disruption, and certain times of year, like New Year’s Eve, can attract a higher risk of unauthorised or disruptive parties.”
Looks like we’ll be celebrating at home this year...