When an Airbnb guest damages your property, you ask the guest to pay first, through Airbnb’s Resolution Centre, within 14 days of their checkout. If they refuse, ignore you or pay part, Airbnb’s Host damage protection reviews the claim, and you have 30 days from checkout to file it with your evidence. The guest stays liable throughout; Airbnb’s guarantee steps in only when they do not pay.
That order matters, because a damage claim is decided by dates and photographs. Booking.com and direct bookings each run their own version, and both are covered below.
The two clocks that start at checkout
Two deadlines run from the moment the responsible guest checks out, and the second one depends on the first.
Day 0 to 14: ask the guest. Airbnb’s Host Damage Protection Terms (section 3.1) require you, within fourteen days of checkout, to explain why the guest is responsible, ask them to pay, and tell Airbnb about the complaint. Sending a reimbursement request through the Resolution Centre does all three at once. Airbnb’s help page then gives the guest 24 hours to respond.
Day 15 to 30: file with Airbnb. If the guest has not paid, section 3.3 gives you until thirty days after checkout to complete the Host Damage Protection payment request form in the Resolution Centre and send the evidence.
Miss the first clock and the second never opens, because Airbnb can only consider a guarantee request once you have shown you asked the guest in time.
Airbnb Host Damage Protection Terms, sections 3.1 and 3.3
Thirty days, and the first fourteen decide the rest
The ring is the month after checkout, drawn to scale. Each segment is one day's share of the circle.
- Days 0 to 14Airbnb: request payment from the guest in the Resolution Centre, which also notifies Airbnb. The guest has 24 hours to reply. Booking.com: the window for a damage claim through the platform.
- Days 15 to 30Airbnb only: if the guest has not paid, file the Host Damage Protection payment request form with your evidence.
- After day 30Both platform routes have closed. What remains is a claim against the guest directly, in court.
What to do in the first hour
Photograph and film the damage before anything is moved, cleaned or thrown away. Then write down the time you found it, what you think caused it, and which booking it followed. Airbnb’s terms ask for “the time, cause and origin” of the loss, and that note is far easier to write on the day than three weeks later.
Then work through this list while the room is still as the guest left it:
- Wide shots and close shots. One frame showing where the damage sits in the room, then close detail. A tape measure or a coin in the close shot gives scale.
- The item’s history. Make, model, roughly when you bought it and what condition it was in. Airbnb asks for a complete inventory of anything lost or damaged with exactly those details, plus the cost to repair or replace.
- A quote, then the invoice. Detailed repair estimates for anything built in (a worktop, a door, a floor), and receipts for specialist cleaning. Airbnb’s terms pay cleaning only where it exceeds the cleaning fee the guest already paid.
- The before picture. The strongest evidence is a photograph of the same item, undamaged, from the changeover before this guest arrived. Without it the guest can say the mark was already there.
- The message. Send the Resolution Centre request the same day, with photos attached, a plain description and the amount. Keep the conversation inside Airbnb’s messaging so it sits on the record Airbnb will review.
Point four is the one most hosts cannot produce, and it comes from the changeover routine. A changeover that ends with a dated photograph of every room turns a disputed claim into a straightforward one.
Who pays: the guest first, then Airbnb
The guest is liable for what they break, and Airbnb’s guarantee sits behind them. Airbnb’s terms put it in those words: the guest has “the primary obligation” to compensate you, and Airbnb guarantees that obligation, paying only “if the Responsible Guest fails to satisfy” it.
That order explains the steps, and it also explains a rule that catches people out: Airbnb deducts anything you have already been paid for the same loss from elsewhere, including an insurance payout, a security deposit or money from the guest. The guarantee fills the gap. It never pays twice.
Airbnb Terms of Service section 16, and Host Damage Protection Terms
The money moves in four steps, in this order
Each arrow is one step. Airbnb only enters at step two, after the guest has been asked.
- 1You ask the guest through the Resolution Centre within 14 days of checkout. They have 24 hours to respond, and if they agree, Airbnb collects the money from them.
- 2You file with Airbnb if they refuse, ignore you or pay part: the payment request form and your evidence, within 30 days of checkout.
- 3Airbnb pays you what the guest owes, less anything already paid for the same loss by insurance, a deposit or the guest.
- 4Airbnb recovers it from the guest. Its terms let it charge the guest's payment method up to $500 and pursue the rest, including through a collections agency.
Step four is the guest’s problem, and it is worth knowing about for a different reason. Under Airbnb’s own terms the guest is told up front that Airbnb can charge their card for a damage report and chase the balance. It is worth mentioning calmly in your first message.
What Airbnb’s damage protection covers, and what it leaves out
Host damage protection reimburses guest damage to your home, furnishings, valuables and belongings, specialist cleaning for stains, pet accidents (the guide to accepting dogs covers the separate pet fee) and smoke odour, and booking income you lose if you have to cancel confirmed Airbnb bookings because of the damage. The ceiling is $3 million per stay. Airbnb lists its own exclusions:
- normal wear and tear
- cleaning that belongs to an ordinary checkout
- loss of currency
- acts of nature, such as storms
- injury, or damage to the guest’s own property, which is a liability question for a different product
Three details in the full terms change what a claim is worth.
- Older items may be paid at their depreciated value. For some property, Airbnb calculates the payment at “Actual Cash Value”, the replacement cost less depreciation and obsolescence. A ten-year-old sofa is not a new sofa.
- Repeat claims count against you. You have an obligation to take reasonable care, and Airbnb reserves the right to refuse a request where the loss came from not taking it, “as may be evidenced by multiple repeat requests for the same type” in the same listing. Three red wine claims on the same cream rug invite the question of why the rug is still cream.
- Airbnb calls it a guarantee. Its terms say it “does not take the place of insurance”, and its help pages say the same. What your own policy should cover, and why landlord and home policies usually exclude paying guests, is in our guide to what insurance a UK Airbnb needs.
The security deposit you probably cannot take
Most Airbnb hosts cannot charge a security deposit at all. Airbnb’s help page on fees collected outside the platform says “most hosts aren’t allowed to charge security deposits”, and the small number of listings permitted to take one off-platform have to show it in the listing’s fee field.
You will still read that Airbnb holds a deposit of a few hundred pounds on the guest’s behalf. Airbnb’s own help centre says the opposite, and asking a guest for an off-platform deposit when your listing is not one of the exceptions breaks Airbnb’s fee rules. On Airbnb, the protection is the Resolution Centre process above.
Booking.com: a claim window and an optional deposit
Booking.com gives you the same 14 days. Its Damage Policy Notice to guests says a property can request a damage fee “up to 14 days after the end of your stay”, starting the claim through the Booking.com platform. Booking.com passes it to the guest, who can agree or dispute it. If the guest agrees, Booking.com charges them. If the guest rejects it and Booking.com accepts the rejection, the claim closes.
The same notice says the property “will not in any case be allowed to charge You directly”. So you cannot quietly take the cost from the card details you hold.
What Booking.com does allow is a damage deposit set in your property policies, where you choose the amount and how and when it is collected and returned. If you list on Booking.com, that deposit is the one part of the process you control yourself, because a claim through the platform turns on how the guest responds. How the channels differ more widely is set out in listing on more than one booking site.
Direct bookings: your terms are the whole protection
A direct booking has no platform process, so the booking terms the guest accepted are all you have. A damage deposit or card pre-authorisation only works if the terms say so before the guest pays, and in plain words: how much, when it is taken, when it is returned, and what can be deducted.
Those terms have to be fair. Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, an unfair term in a consumer contract “is not binding on the consumer” (section 62), and the Act’s list of terms that may be unfair includes one requiring a consumer who breaks the contract “to pay a disproportionately high sum in compensation” (Schedule 2, paragraph 6). A deposit sized to the property and returned promptly after checkout sits comfortably inside that. A large non-refundable “damage fee” does not.
In England, a deposit for a genuine holiday stay does not go into a tenancy deposit scheme. That duty, in section 213 of the Housing Act 2004, applies to assured tenancies, and a tenancy whose purpose is a holiday is excluded from being one by paragraph 9 of Schedule 1 to the Housing Act 1988. Longer stays are a different matter, explained in our guide to mid-term lets. The wider set-up for taking your own bookings is in how to get direct bookings for a holiday let.
When the platform route fails: the small claims court
A guest who refuses to pay can still be taken to court. In England and Wales, you claim through the county court online or by post. Claims up to £10,000 now include a free one-hour mediation appointment with HMCTS’s Small Claims Mediation Service before any hearing.
The court fee depends on the amount:
| Amount claimed | Court fee |
|---|---|
| Up to £300 | £35 |
| £300.01 to £500 | £50 |
| £500.01 to £1,000 | £70 |
| £1,000.01 to £1,500 | £80 |
| £1,500.01 to £3,000 | £115 |
| £3,000.01 to £5,000 | £205 |
| £5,000.01 to £10,000 | £455 |
Two practical limits apply. You need the guest’s address, and the online service only works where both you and the guest have an address in England or Wales; otherwise the claim goes by post. In Scotland, claims under £5,000 that are not complicated use the simple procedure.
Weigh the fee and the time against the amount before you start. A court claim earns its cost on serious damage the platform has refused to pay for, and for most breakages the Resolution Centre is quicker.
How a well-run let keeps claims rare
The cheapest claim is the one that never needs making, and that comes from how the property is run. Clear house rules on the listing, a check-in message that names the two or three things that matter in this particular house, washable or replaceable fabrics where guests eat and drink, and a dated photograph of every room at every changeover.
The last of those does double duty. It is the before picture a claim depends on, and it is the record that shows the place was ready for the next guest. A property booked back to back cannot afford a room out of action for a fortnight while a dispute runs, which is why the damage protection’s cover for lost bookings matters as much as the repair.
If you are weighing up handing the property over, the changeover standard and how claims are handled belong in the management agreement. If you want to know what the property could earn first, our free valuation covers both: the income, and what it takes to keep the place earning it.
Frequently asked questions
How long do I have to claim for damage on Airbnb?
Fourteen days from the responsible guest’s checkout to request payment from the guest through the Resolution Centre, which also notifies Airbnb. If the guest does not pay, you have until thirty days after checkout to file the Host Damage Protection payment request form with your evidence.
Can Airbnb charge the guest’s card for damage?
Yes. If the guest agrees to pay, Airbnb collects the amount. If they do not and Airbnb decides they are responsible, Airbnb’s terms for European users let it charge the guest’s payment method up to $500 and pursue any balance by other means, including a collections agency.
Does Airbnb pay for wear and tear?
No. Normal wear and tear is listed as an exclusion, as is the cleaning that belongs to an ordinary checkout. Specialist cleaning for stains, pet accidents and smoke odour can be covered, but only the cost above the cleaning fee the guest already paid.
Can I take an Airbnb guest to the small claims court?
Yes. In England and Wales you claim through the county court, and claims up to £10,000 go to a free one-hour mediation appointment first. You will need the guest’s address.
Sources
- Airbnb: Host Damage Protection Terms (help article 2869, last updated 1 August 2026; section 1, the guest’s primary obligation and Airbnb’s guarantee; section 2.6, reasonable care and repeat requests; section 3.1, the 14-day request to the guest; section 3.3, the 30-day payment request form and evidence; sections 5.3 and 7, ineligible property and Actual Cash Value; deduction of insurance, deposits and guest payments; read 2026-10-22)
- Airbnb Help Centre: Host damage protection (help article 542; steps, the 24-hour guest response, what is covered and excluded, lost booking income; read 2026-10-22)
- Airbnb Help Centre: Getting protected through AirCover for Hosts (help article 3142; $3m Host damage protection, not a substitute for personal insurance; read 2026-10-22)
- Airbnb: Terms of Service (terms for European users, sections 3 and 16.1 to 16.2, Damage Reports and the $500 payment method limit; last updated 5 February 2026; read 2026-10-22)
- Airbnb Help Centre: Collecting fees outside Airbnb (help article 2827; most hosts may not charge security deposits; read 2026-10-22)
- Booking.com: Damage Policy Notice (14 days after the stay, guest agreement or rejection, no direct charging by the property; read 2026-10-22)
- Booking.com for Developers: Property settings API, create property settings (damage deposit policy fields: amount, collection and return method and timing; read 2026-10-22)
- legislation.gov.uk: Consumer Rights Act 2015, section 62 and Schedule 2 (unfair terms not binding; paragraph 6, disproportionately high compensation; read 2026-10-22)
- legislation.gov.uk: Housing Act 2004, section 213 (tenancy deposits for assured tenancies, as amended by the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 from 1 May 2026; read 2026-10-22) and Housing Act 1988, Schedule 1 (paragraph 9, holiday lettings)
- GOV.UK: Make a court claim for money (claiming online or by post; when you cannot claim online; court fees by amount; read 2026-10-22)
- GOV.UK: Faster resolution for small claims as mediation baked into courts process (free one-hour mediation for money claims up to £10,000; published 22 May 2024; read 2026-10-22)
- mygov.scot: Make a court claim for money (simple procedure for cases under £5,000; last updated 4 February 2021; read 2026-10-22)
