GalaHotels.com Attention

perroas

Never book with this site they are rogues. I booked two hotels in Cuba from 26/12/18 to 13/01/2019. He charged me 2800 euros. Upon arrival at the hotel I was told that the reservation was canceled. The site does not answer the phone or the complaints via the customer support links. I am filing a complaint. Here is a link where several people like me have been a victim of these crooks.
Do a search on TripAdvisor Galahotels.com

Westin

It appears that this Turkish based online agent has simply locked up shop and stopped trading.

Booking via this overseas business gave no consumer financial protection and a cautionary warning.

Best recourse will be an attempt via your credit card company for a refund.

shaun_from_Africa

Westin wrote: »

Booking via this overseas business gave no consumer financial protection and a cautionary warning.

Best recourse will be an attempt via your credit card company for a refund.

Booking with a overseas company does have consumer financial protection if a credit card was used.
Section 75 applies to overseas contracts provided the requirements for this were complied with.


perroas, did you pay for any part of the hotel booking with a credit card?
If so, contact your card issuer and ask them to start processing a "section 75" claim.
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/section75-protect-your-purchases/

JustinRC

I don't think it's as simple as they've gone bust and locked up I believe this is a scam. Their website is still up and running and taking bookings.

The way it works is that they take your money and make the booking through an intermediary hotelbeds.com but they never forward payment to Hotel Beds who then cancel the reservation a few weeks after the reservation has been made. So if you call the hotel before the reservation is cancelled they will confirm your reservation. Not that I did this I just turned up expecting everything was ok!

You get no response trying to contact Gala Hotels or Leonardo travel. Hotel Beds (the intermediary) cite Leonardo Travel as being the clients (me) travel agent who had not paid them in their email to the hotel cancelling the reservation. I do wonder if there is a case that the intermediary is acting as an agent for Gala Hotels. Does anyone know? Could I make a claim against them? I have tried emailing them as well.

I have also reported Gala Hotels to the National Fraud and Cyber Crime Reporting Centre who take reports on behalf of the UK police. First of all they won't log it as a crime since I am still in the process of trying to get my money back through chargeback, but they also tell me I am the only person who has logged a complaint against this company. Which seems bizarre when you see the pages of complaints on trip advisor. Apperently they will act if they receive a number of complaints but for now my report is just logged for information.

*** So please if anyone in the uk has comes to this page having been scammed by Gala Hotels, Leonardo Travel or Vanilla Tours (they are all the same co.) please report them to actionfraud.police.uk. ***

Westin

Are you sure Gala are still taking bookings? When I looked at their site a few weeks ago you could do a search but not make a booking. Searches for me came back as no availability.

Being a Turkish company, can Action Fraud do anything meaningful or are they just going to be able to record the complaint?

JustinRC

Westin wrote: »

Are you sure Gala are still taking bookings? When I looked at their site a few weeks ago you could do a search but not make a booking. Searches for me came back as no availability.

Well I've not gone as far as actually clicking on the button and booking a room but if you do a search rooms are certainly coming up as available to book.

Westin wrote: »

Being a Turkish company, can Action Fraud do anything meaningful or are they just going to be able to record the complaint?

Relations with Turkey are not at their best but we're not alienated. As UK citizens are being affected surely it's reasonable to expect UK law and order authorities to at least communicate with the Turkish authorities when an ongoing crime is being committed.

HoofeHearted

Earlier thread about them.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/1866239/galahotels-com-has-anyone-used-this-site