02-03-2012, 11:57 AM
Kelena,
We have the same policy at our vacation rental as you had at your's - whoever sends in their deposit first gets the place. In Susan's case, she and another renter both inquired about availability at about the same time, both were still getting their plans firmed up, and the 5 week renter came in first with a deposit to lock in their reservation. I was torn while I waited to see who'd commit first, because Susan is a return renter (and a PunaWebber!). But bigger forces were in play I think. Another party had rented the place for four weeks in late February/early March, but then had to cancel at the last minute because his best friend was just diagnosed with a brain tumor and given 2 months to live. According to our policy, if you cancel this late in the game, we only do a refund if we can rebook the cancelled time (especially in cases like this month when we had turned away lots of business due to the previous confirmed reservation). Because Susan's competition beat her to the punch and locked in the 5 week reservation (including the other guy's reserved four weeks), the guy who who cancelled is getting a full refund. He intends to reschedule his trip to come over in the fall. And we sure hope Susan and Dave will make it back to our place some other time too
So yes, based on our rentals so far this year, tourism is definitely up!
We have the same policy at our vacation rental as you had at your's - whoever sends in their deposit first gets the place. In Susan's case, she and another renter both inquired about availability at about the same time, both were still getting their plans firmed up, and the 5 week renter came in first with a deposit to lock in their reservation. I was torn while I waited to see who'd commit first, because Susan is a return renter (and a PunaWebber!). But bigger forces were in play I think. Another party had rented the place for four weeks in late February/early March, but then had to cancel at the last minute because his best friend was just diagnosed with a brain tumor and given 2 months to live. According to our policy, if you cancel this late in the game, we only do a refund if we can rebook the cancelled time (especially in cases like this month when we had turned away lots of business due to the previous confirmed reservation). Because Susan's competition beat her to the punch and locked in the 5 week reservation (including the other guy's reserved four weeks), the guy who who cancelled is getting a full refund. He intends to reschedule his trip to come over in the fall. And we sure hope Susan and Dave will make it back to our place some other time too
So yes, based on our rentals so far this year, tourism is definitely up!