Anything I can do?

lufcgirl

Hi

Back at the end of last month, I booked an apartment for a night down in Cardiff using booking.com. If you've used it before it always tells you you can pay on arrival by a variety of methods.

Anyway, we booked, and during the course of the following week I recieved no less than 20 calls from the company. I had just moved departments working 9-5 in training so could only call them back on breaks. It went something like this

1) They called, asking me to call them
2) I call back, they wanted to confirm the booking
3) They call again, saying I needed to pay a deposit for the room
4) I call back, said I didn't want the room
5) They call again, saying theres a mix up and I don't need to pay a deposit
6) I call back and say thats fine but I want to pay cash on arrival
(Getting tedious by now!)
7) They call again, saying no, need to take a card payment on arrival

At this point, it was the Thursday afternoon. I tried to call them eight times on the afternoon (well within their 48 hour rule for cancellations which is nowhere to be seen on the booking) to cancel. They don't answer the phone between the hours of 2.30pm and 5.30pm apparently. I have call records stating these calls.

On the Friday I call again to cancel and was told it's fine. And now, two weeks on they've taken £85.00 from my bank account. To say I'm mad is an understatement. They've given me the go-around and apparently held my card details on file for at least two weeks, so what if they try and take more money?

Does anybody know what I should do? Should I just let them take it, as for some reason they think they're entitled to it as part of a cancellation fee for me not cancelling on the Thursday, which I tried to do?

Thanks for any help

dmg24

Call them when they are back open - it could be a genuine mistake.

If no joy, call your bank and (assuming it was a Visa debit) ask them to do a chargeback. Give them all the info you have stated here, and take a copy of the terms and conditions of booking now just in case they change it in the meantime!

lufcgirl

It's a Visa Electon (use it as my normal account now thanks to Ryanair!). Does that make a difference?

I went into a branch this morning who could only see an 85.00 charge pending, I had to call telephone banking to find out who to. And they never said they could do a chargeback, just send it to the fraud department but I know who it is! Most unhelpful in the branch.

lufcgirl

So I fired off a letter of complaint to the company. No response back within the timescale given and so I called them. The 'office manager' said it was tough and that because I didn't cancel through booking.com it wasn't their responsibility.
The bank aren't doing much, I've sent them my phone call lists and nobody has even bothered to have a look.

Can anybody help with the best way to proceed here? As far as I'm concerned they've held onto my card details for two weeks after they should have and taken money they shouldn't have.