It had to happen sooner or later, because progress doesn’t stop, history evolves, the world goes on despite the physiological tendencies of conservators to crystallize the past: the share of Airbnb business travel reservations – the community that offers access to millions of exclusive accommodations, from villas and apartments to castles and tree houses in more than 65,000 cities in 191 nations – has surpassed the symbolic (but significant) threshold of 10%.
In 2016, the volume of people moving for work tripled. Business people are trying to reconcile their free time: last year, 50% of business bookings on Airbnb included Saturday night.
The community celebrated this milestone by both announcing that as many as 250,000 companies registered worldwide and releasing a new tool, Business Travel Ready, designed to further meet this segment.
With Business travel ready – visible only to verified business users logging in with their business email account – available ads will be filtered on specific criteria, greatly improving search results and selecting about 150,000 accommodations.
This is a specific type of ads precisely responding to the needs of business people. In particular, they are distinguished by:
- self check-in: business travellers must be able to check in at any time they need; these ads have intelligent unlock, key box, numeric keypad or janitor operating 24 hours a day, so that guests can easily access the ad accommodation;
- business services: the accommodations must be equipped with wifi connection, an area where to work comfortably on the computer, smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, an iron, coat rack, shampoo and other basic products;
- whole house: the type of room is whole house/apartment, the type of property must be suitable, and the space must be non-smokers and no-pets;
- 5 star reviews: ads must have received five stars at least in 60% of overall reviews as well as in those about cleanliness and accuracy;
- responsiveness: hosts respond to 90% of booking requests within 24 hours;
- commitment: hosts don’t cancel confirmed reservations less than seven days prior to the check-in date.