De vere - naughty naughty!

ellissa

Just a quick warning, I'm not sure this is allowed...

I booked some rooms at a De Vere hotel over the phone, directly with the hotel. I paid with my visa debit card for my account which is in my name only, not a joint acc. All fine, no probs.

My husband then phoned the same hotel to make a reservation on the same night for our friends to stay also. He called instead of me as I was working and he paid with his card, a visa credit card also in his sole name not joint with me. All seemed ok. 6pm comes, hubby gets home from work and theres a message on the voicemail to say the card had declined. He tried to call reservations but they were closed and as it was friday he could not get hold of the lady til monday.

Monday comes and hubby calls the lady. She informed him that she just debited my card instead! She had no permission from me, no permission from him but it is not his acc anyway. She had no real proof that we are married (apart from the same surname and telephone number which we had given). So in effect, some guy had rung the hotel, card declined and she used mine instead as we had the same name and phone number! Is this legal???! Hubby and I have no joint finances at all.

Incidentally, turned out the card had declined cos she input the wrong number. Email confirmation bounced as she recorded the wrong email address and 3 guests names were recorded incorrectly too. All of these things, we confirmed and triple checked with her!

Fuming!

Toe-Jam

Technically no they shouldn't have done that. But if it was a small local hotel they might have thought you were doing you a favour. So there are two ways to look at it I suppose.

I don't think i'd be too happy either tho.

Crazy_Jamie

No, the saleswoman had no right to do that at all, and to be honest I would be pretty irritated by that as well. If I was a manager at the hotel I would also be somewhat concerned that any member of staff would consider doing something like that. It shows remarkably poor judgment even if the intentions were honourable.

However, as everything has been corrected now and (I presume) no actual damage has been done, then you can do little else in this situation other than complain (preferably to the manager of the hotel). As it is De Vere you might find yourself with a complimentary addition to your room when you turn up for your troubles, though of course you can't count on that.

pendulum

Its a difficult situation because no, she didn't have the right in theory to debit your account, but as you had the same surname and phone number, it's obvious your related, and she knows your card worked - so she debited your card. There was no bad intent, it seems she was just trying to do you both a favour, but no she didn't have the "right" to do it.

If her actions had caused you to go overdrawn, then they'd definitely have had to pay, but as it seems you haven't lost any money due to this, I wouldn't expect any 'compensation' (I hate that word). You could fill out a comments form when you're at the hotel or write a letter to management letting them know what happened though as it does seem she could do with some more training. Maybe she's just new and got flustered. Or you could just leave it. People do make mistakes...

barnabee

Agree thats not the proper procedure. The only thing I can't work out is that if you both both booked directly with the hotel, why couldn't you ring the hotel direct, rather than reservations when you found out there was a problem? I don't understand why you had to wait until Monday. De Vere hotels are open 24-7.

Crazy_Jamie

barnabee wrote: »

The only thing I can't work out is that if you both both booked directly with the hotel, why couldn't you ring the hotel direct, rather than reservations when you found out there was a problem? I don't understand why you had to wait until Monday. De Vere hotels are open 24-7.

You can ring the hotel direct, but the bookings system at De Vere is done through reservations. The hotel itself would not have been able to alter anything.

Gemmy_2

No she definitely shouldn't of done that. I'd take that much higher.
On her defense on taking bits of the reservation wrong - shes only human she should of worked out that she was putting in the card details wrong but the other stuff could is quite human to get wrong.

jimbms

Technically this is theft and you should inform the head office of such and you are considering reporting this. You may get a nice VIP short break out of it.

Crazy_Jamie

jimbms wrote: »

Technically this is theft and you should inform the head office of such and you are considering reporting this. You may get a nice VIP short break out of it.

No, it isn't. The money was not taken dishonestly. Therefore it cannot be theft.

ShaneUK

Crazy_Jamie wrote: »

No, it isn't. The money was not taken dishonestly. Therefore it cannot be theft.

I am sorry, but I agree - it is theft. The OP didnt give permission for her card to be debited, but De Vere took from it. If someone takes a sum of money away from you without your permission, wouldn't you class it as theft? (And if you don't, please PM me your account number and sort code, and I will take X amount from you as I can't get it from someone else.....)

jimbms

Crazy_Jamie wrote: »

No, it isn't. The money was not taken dishonestly. Therefore it cannot be theft.

Wrong. To take funds from an account other than the one authorised without permission is theft. There are very few occasions it is followed up by the police but when rported it nearly always results in a refund. http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/26/banking-case-roundup-26.htm