In 1995, VRBO introduced a new way for people to travel together, pairing homeowners with people looking for places to stay. VRBO's purpose is to give people the space they need to drop the distractions of everyday life and simply be together. The channel offers homeowners and property managers exposure to over 750 million visits to Expedia Group sites each month.
Vacation Rentals By Owner (VRBO) is part of the HomeAway family.
We already have VRBO API connection to Cloudbeds PMS available. Click here to learn more.
Things you should know before getting started
- Calendar based channels only support: availability updates, booking downloads, and automatic adjustments. They do not support rates.
- Check this article before moving forward: Calendar channels (ical connection) - Everything you need to know
- Even though VRBO is owned by Expedia, it is not possible to make the connection to this channel through Expedia.
- Cloudbeds does not control how frequently calendar channels poll us for availability, so it can take 0.5 to 2 hours for availability to reflect on the channel. Please confirm this interval with your HomeAway Account Manager.
Connect VRBO ical (HomeAway) to Cloudbeds PMS
Access the Distribution page and,
- Search for VRBO (ical) in the Discover tab
- Click to view channel
- Click to enable the channel
- Choose the first room type that you want to sync and click on copy link
Calendar-based channels do not provide the number of guests in a reservation, so bookings for shared/dorm rooms will be imported as 1 bed by default, even though there could be more. It's safest not to update/sell dorm rooms on this channel.
In another tab, log into your HomeAway dashboard and follow the steps below
- Click on Calendar
- Select Import & Export
- Click on Import a Calendar
- Enter the calendar URL from your Cloudbeds PMS previously copied on Step 3
- Choose How calendar events import (Block or Don't block)
- Click Next
In order to block availability, the event must span at least one night.
- Name your calendar
- Select a color for your imported calendar
- Click on Import
It may take up to 20 minutes to see your imported calendar events.
If you need to sync additional calendars: select a new listing on HomeAway and repeat the steps above for all of your HomeAway rooms.
On your HomeAway dashboard, obtain your HomeAway export calendar URL:
- Click on Import & Export tab
- Click on Export Calendar
- Uncheck the option Include Tentative Reservations in the calendar export.* This will stop all guest inquiry reservations coming through the iCal.
- Click on Copy URL to copy the HomeAway calendar
*Leaving this option unchecked will prevent the following situation:
Calendar-based channels do not support cancelations. Also, all inquiry reservations are considered as "confirmed bookings" and not tentative.
When the guest books the room on HomeAway, even if it's only a tentative, the system will send this reservation as confirmed to Cloudbeds PMS. It means that this reservation will close your availability.
The property needs to cancel the existing reservation in Cloudbeds PMS, so they will be able to clear it in the HomeAway calendar allowing the guest to book.
If the guest decided not to make the reservation, the request would expire after 24 hours on HomeAway side, but the reservation remains on Cloudbeds PMS because the property needs to manage cancelations manually.
- Paste the HomeAway URL in your Cloudbeds PMS account
If you need to sync additional calendars: select a new listing on HomeAway and repeat the steps above for all of your HomeAway rooms.
- Once you finish all your room types, on Cloudbeds PMS, click to Continue
HomeAway has several brands such as Stayz, FeWo, Abritel, VacationRentals.com, Toprural, Bookabach, Alugue Temporada and others.
Within Cloudbeds, we only accept HomeAway or VRBO URLs, but it does not mean that you can not connect the listings from other brands. Follow the steps below in order to connect other HomeAway's brand.
Let's take Alugue Temporada listing as an example. Here's the URL:
When you paste Alugue Temporada URL, you will probably see the error message below:
To fix this, replace the highlighted part from www.aluguetemporada.com.br to www.homeaway.com and keep the rest of the URL exactly the same:
Cancelations from a calendar channel cannot be transmitted to any 3rd parties (including myallocator, - Channel Manager by Cloudbeds).
Since myallocator (Cloudbeds PMS channel manager) is unaware of any Calendar Channel cancelations, you must manage the inventory manually.
Example:
- Guest books your property and the booking is sent to myallocator (channel manager)
- Guest cancels the booking
- Myallocator is unaware of the cancellation
- You must log in to Cloudbeds PMS and cancel the booking manually (by changing the reservation status to canceled)
On the following article, learn How to Cancel a reservation.
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