Priceline messed up and won't offer refund! Help?

charlotteallen99

Please help!

I'd looked on here and saw great things about booking with priceline and was keen to get a bargain on a Berlin hotel for 3 nights. My other half and I selected 4&5* hotels in central Berlin areas and started the bidding process. Our bid was accepted at £55 per night but when the details were sent out it was a 3* hotel!!

Price line are adamant this can't happen but we certainly didn't click 3* as that was in our budget range anyway so there would have been no point! To top it off its the same price as expedia. And pricleline insisted on the phone that they will give you the highest star hotel in the area!! It seems like a load of rubbish and its our 3 year anniversary on Wednesday and I feel as if we've been cheated!! Its really not a great hotel and its a special occasion

HELP!!

richardw

Didn't you work out which 4 or 5 star hotel it was likely to be before bidding and double checking prices elsewhere? Sorry to sound a bit sharp, but MSE sort of advises this.

charlotteallen99

We had an idea but its a 3* hotel and even priceline have rated it as 3* but we definitely selected 4&5*. Do you see what I mean?

charlotteallen99

So we wouldn't have thought in our wildest dreams that they would give us a 3* as its not what we asked for! Its very frustrating , I knew the risk but had an idea of the 4%5* hotels in the area and was happy with getting anyone of those. What I did not anticipate was getting a 3* back when that was not selected. Both my other half and myself were in front of the computer and looked over it!

tomtontom

Unless you can duplicate the error I fear you are stuck

vegasvisitor

So you are saying that you selected 4* and 5* and it then accepted and gave you a lower rating? Is this normal priceline rather than express? I have used express the last few times as it's a bit more obvious what you're getting. It's also useful as a tool to guess where to bid on the normal priceline bids to get the same hotel (hopefully slightly cheaper).

If I've understood you correctly I agree that you must feel cheated, however it sounds like they're not accepting this. Call them back. Ask to speak to a manager. Stay polite. Use the word complaint. Hopefully you get somewhere with it.

charlotteallen99

So we've looked around for a 3 night hotel stay in Berlin and I've seen good reviews for priceline. We get there Wednesday and come back Saturday and deals weren't great for this week elsewhere; international film festival is taking place in Berlin and Queen are touring so it may be due to that!

We've gone on to priceline after reading about it on Martin Lewis website and checked the areas we wanted to stay in which we knew were good areas and we've checked the 4* box and the 5* box. We put in a bid for £55 per night and it was accepted.

However when we've had the deal sent through its a 3* hotel and I don't mean its a 3* hotel on certain websites or anything like that. I mean that PRICELINE THEMSELVES have rated it as 3*!

So we've called and they've said that it must have been our mistake when both my partner and I know full well what we selected. They've told us that automatically priceline will give us the highest starred hotel in the area for that price- which I don't believe. But even if that were true we never selected 3* so they can't just give us that as that's all they've got. We never selected 3* and I'm so upset we now have a very very basic hotel and have been told they won't move us and won't refund us. Its a special break and I'm really not looking forward to it now

MasterPoo

Hi Charlotte, as stated above have you tried and been able to replicate your order?

If you can replicate it and DEMONSTRATE/screenshot the replication to show that it is an error on THEIR side, then you could stand a better chance of hopefully getting a refund?

I've tried doing it according to your steps above, but of course I didn't filter "the areas we wanted to stay in which we knew were good areas", what did you select on this step?

richardw

I do see what you mean. If you paid by credit card, perhaps you can say to Priceline that you'll get your card issuer to do a S75 charge back, perhaps only do this if you can get screen shots as mentioned above.

I've tried the Priceline thing, but only with 5 star hotels, but they weren't a real bargain, so I didn't book.

Have a good read of the reviews of the hotel on booking.com, it may be an OK 3 star hotel, standards in Germany are generally high, so you may be OK.

charlotteallen99

Unfortunately I paid by debit

We've selected Bradenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie, City Center Tiergarten, Bohemian District and Alexanderplatz. Then went on to select 4* and 5* and have been given 3* Days Inn Berlin City South.

I'm tearing my hair out here! I'm not sure how we could go about getting screenshots of what we selected? I'm so stressed as we go Wednesday and it doesn't look likely that anything will be done and certainly not before then!

tomtontom

On a positive, the reviews for the hotel are good - you could have ended up with worse in a higher category.

You can keep complaining in the hope someone will be sympathetic but nowadays PL are pretty inflexible.