What happens to my bookings if I change manager or end the contract? Who looks after them, who has been paid and what cannot be transferred

Short answer: bookings that are already confirmed do not disappear because you break with your manager: they are contracts with guests and someone has to look after them. Who does it depends on two things: whose name the listings are in and who has been paid for each booking. If the listings are yours, you just change the collaborator and the bookings stay in your account. If they are the manager's, on Airbnb they cannot be moved to another account and on Booking they are only transferred if the outgoing manager starts the change. Cancelling them is expensive for whoever cancels. The sensible thing is to agree in writing who looks after each booking up to the date of the change.

What do I check first?

Three things, before telling the manager anything:

1. Whose name the listings are in on Booking and Airbnb: yours, with the manager as collaborator, or the manager's account. We explain it in Whose name should the listings be in?.
2. Who appears as holder of the operation in the Tourism Register. If the manager hands over keys, welcomes guests and cleans, the Junta says it should be them.
3. Who has been paid for each booking: the platform (which pays later), the manager or you.

With that, make a list of all confirmed bookings from the date of the change: channel, dates, amount, how much has already been paid and who has it.

Who is answerable to the guest?

The one answerable to the authorities and to the guest is whoever appears as holder of the operation: Decree 28/2016 says that this person «shall be responsible before the Administration and before the users for the correct provision of the service» (art. 4.1). Their name is the one that appears on the document given to the guest on arrival (art. 7.1).

But the flat is yours. If the manager leaves and nobody opens the door, the problem ends up being yours too, and the guest has the right to receive the service «under the conditions offered or agreed» (art. 21.d of Law 13/2011). That is why it is not enough for the contract to end: you have to decide who looks after each booking.

Can the outgoing manager cancel them?

Technically yes, if they are in their account. But there are consequences for whoever cancels:

Selling the flat or changing manager is not one of the valid reasons Airbnb accepts for cancelling without a penalty (serious damage, serious health problems, extenuating circumstances…). And Airbnb expressly prohibits asking the guest to cancel themselves.

What is more, leaving the platform does not get anyone off the hook: Booking warns that ending the contract «doesn't cancel any outstanding reservations» and that, if they are not honoured, the relocation has to be paid for. Airbnb does not let you delete a listing with upcoming bookings, and if the account is deactivated, upcoming bookings are cancelled.

Can Airbnb bookings be moved to another account?

No. Airbnb says so plainly: there is no way to transfer an account to another host, and «bookings cannot be transferred to a new host or to another account». Nor can a booking modification be used to hand the management over to someone else.

That leaves two routes:

• The listing is yours and the manager was a co-host. You remove them and add the new one. The bookings stay in your account. Careful: the removed co-host stops receiving their commission for bookings that start afterwards, so how they get paid for the ones they sold has to be agreed separately. And you remain responsible for the bookings they accepted.
• The listing is the manager's. The bookings stay in their account until they are completed. The usual thing is to agree that they look after them until the last check-out, or that the new manager looks after them on their behalf, without touching the booking. Your new listing will start from scratch, with no reviews.

And on Booking?

Booking does allow the property to be transferred from one account to another (it calls it change of ownership), including when what changes is the management company. What you need to know:

• Only whoever currently has it in their name can start it. If you or the new manager ask, Booking needs the current holder's consent.
• Future bookings move to the new holder.
• The new holder is answerable for obligations prior to the change, and outstanding invoices and debts are transferred to them.
• Payments by Booking payouts issued after the change go to the new holder. Even if the booking was sold by the outgoing manager. This has to be taken into account in the final statement.
• The channel manager is disconnected, programmes such as Genius are deactivated and message templates are deleted.
• It takes up to seven days and, in the meantime, the property keeps receiving bookings.

Reviews: Booking's official help on the transfer says nothing about them. As the same property is being transferred, the normal thing is that they stay, but confirm it with Booking before taking anything for granted.

And direct bookings?

If a guest paid an advance to the manager, that money is yours: the manager is obliged «to account for their dealings and to pay the principal whatever they have received» (art. 1720 of the Civil Code). Ask for the list of direct bookings with the advances received and for them to be handed over to you, or passed on to the new manager, in the statement.

What does the law say if the contract says nothing?

The management contract largely works as a mandate (mandato): someone does something on your behalf. The Civil Code sets these rules:

• You can revoke it whenever you want (art. 1733), without prejudice to any notice period or penalty you signed.
• Appointing a new manager for the same thing revokes the previous one from the moment they are told (art. 1735). Do it in writing.
• If it is the manager who resigns, even with good reason, they have to keep managing «until the principal has been able to make the necessary arrangements» (art. 1737). They cannot leave you with a guest arriving tomorrow.
• In any case, they have to account to you and hand over what they have received (art. 1720).

The best thing is not to depend on this: the contract should say what happens to future bookings when it ends. We cover it in The contract with the manager.

When is the holder changed in the Tourism Register?

Before the change. Decree 143/2014 on the Tourism Register requires changes of holder to be notified «in all cases beforehand» (art. 6.2.b). It is filed by the new holder (the new manager, or you if you are going to manage it yourself) with the notification form, procedure 7267. The home's code does not change. Careful with the outgoing manager: the cessation can be requested by whoever appears as holder, and cessation cancels the registration. What is needed is a change of holder, not a cessation. It is in Changing the licence holder.

What do I do before giving the manager notice?

1. Read your contract: notice period, penalty and what it says about the listings and future bookings.
2. Make the list of bookings from the date of the change: channel, dates, amount, paid and who has it.
3. Decide with the new manager which bookings each one looks after and until what date.
4. Give notice in writing, with the date and a concrete proposal for the bookings, and ask for the full calendar and the statement.
5. Booking: if the property is the manager's, agree that they start the transfer and how the payouts that arrive afterwards are shared.
6. Airbnb: if the listing is yours, change co-host; if it is theirs, agree that they look after their bookings until the last check-out.
7. Tourism Register: the new holder must notify the change before the date.
8. Last day: keys, codes, guest register, inventory and signed statement.

The full process, step by step, is in How to change manager, and the questions to stop this happening with the next one, in 20 questions before signing with a manager.