LHH Scotland cottage booking refund

Sylvestris

For those of you who do not read Google Reviews I thought it would be interesting to share this review written by “Linda” a week ago:

We booked for a week in April, but due to the Covid-19 travel restrictions it was cancelled. I asked the company if I could move our dates and they refused point blank, told me the cottage owners would be losing income and told me I had to claim through my insurance, I sent several emails to them about this and got very unhelpful responses. So I tried to claim through insurance and failed due to the terms and conditions of my policy, I was eventually able to contact the holiday cottage owner who had sacked LHH due to their customer service! She told me she had from the start wanted to refund everybody or move dates but LHH had refused because they did not want to refund their admin fees which were £120 per week, she was very upset about this and had herself received an appalling service from LHH when she told them she was leaving. She said other cottage owners were also sacking off LHH for the same reasons. Appalling company please beware, I would never use this company again.

I sincerely hope that Linda is correct and I hope that the honest and honourable property owners are having second thoughts about using LHH Scotland as their agent. LHH Scotland do not have a monopoly on managing 4 and 5 star accommodation. I note that the number of properties listed on the LHH website has recently dropped from 128 to 126; a not insignificant shortfall on the number of 140 properties the company claimed that they managed in The Scotsman article published on 11th July 2020.      

Google Reviews are an excellent platform to increase the general awareness of LHH Scotland’s disappointing behaviour during the Coronavirus pandemic. It pops up whenever a potential customer Googles “LHH Scotland”. So to keep the momentum going I urge everyone who has been left out of pocket by this company to share their experience on Google Reviews.

ElvisU309

Is there any way to identify who the property owners are? I tried a few weeks ago to get the details of the property owners for our booking but my efforts proved fruitless. I would ask LHH to provide these but I doubt they will! I have noticed that the property is still on the LHH website. 

whinlatterdrive

I was given the owners details and contact number as well as an email address from LHH when I paid in full (£1710) way back in March!!  For nothing!    The cottage was in South Uist, Outer Hebrides.  I would assume therefore others who have had to pay in fulll will also have contact numbers/email addresses.  Maybe someone would have the contact details you need?

Sutch

Sylvestris said:

On 23rd July 2020 Sutch said: I'm currently investigating the legal process for personally prosecuting a director on the basis of wrongful trading and illegal activity which is removed from taking action against a legal entity. This is an action distinct from prosecuting a company whereby - directors may find themselves personally liable for the debts and obligations of their company based on their personal conduct and disregard for the law.

I would like to give the director and owner of LHH Scotland, Wynne Bentley (aka Wynne Shilland) the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think that she is necessarily a greedy and immoral person. I think that she may have been given erroneous legal advice by her solicitor who could in fairness, have been a bit out of their depth. It is now difficult for her to back down. It is admirable that Wynne has clearly tried to protect her key customers, the property owners, and allow them to keep all the money. BUT this is at the expense of her other set of customers, the property renters, who in many cases have lost all of their money. You need both sets of customers for a successful business. To be told that LHH have no legal responsibility to refund any money and the property renter should seek recovery from their insurer is just not fair and equitable. Why didn’t LHH and the property owners have insurance? 

I've abbreviated the full post from Sylvestris which can be read in the thread above.
While I think this is a charitable view of the management team, I think their sentiments are totally misplaced. The property owners indeed "notionally" lose a booking/s but suffer no detriment,whereas the customers lose their holiday and their money - double blow. Under the present scenario LHH and the owners not only lose nothing but equally provide nothing. They make their full 100% fee. By any measure this is hardly "equal misery for all" and amounts to 100% profiteering from a global disaster.
Like Sylvestris, I too question the legal advice from Wright, Johnson and Mackenzie which flies in the face of the enforcement ruling by the CMA who have compelled all other such holiday businesses to offer a full & unconditional refund.
In summary there is no equality of sacrifice or of bargaining position and I might be more inclined to side with Sylvestris had LHH attempted to be even remotely conciliatory. If anything I feel they are becoming more entrenched and hostile.
There is a legal doctrine "Pactum serva" which means "keep thy contract". The gist of this that when times get tough, the true honourable and professional operators stand by their obligations, irrespective of the fact that things didn't turn out as anticipated.

ElvisU309

whinlatterdrive said:

I was given the owners details and contact number as well as an email address from LHH when I paid in full (£1710) way back in March!!  For nothing!    The cottage was in South Uist, Outer Hebrides.  I would assume therefore others who have had to pay in fulll will also have contact numbers/email addresses.  Maybe someone would have the contact details you need?

We also paid in full but did not receive any of those details from LHH. The property we had booked was Maivaig House on the Isle of Lewis. If anyone has their details I would be very grateful. 

ElvisU309

I've abbreviated the full post from Sylvestris which can be read in the thread above.

While I think this is a charitable view of the management team, I think their sentiments are totally misplaced. The property owners indeed "notionally" lose a booking/s but suffer no detriment,whereas the customers lose their holiday and their money - double blow. Under the present scenario LHH and the owners not only lose nothing but equally provide nothing. They make their full 100% fee. By any measure this is hardly "equal misery for all" and amounts to 100% profiteering from a global disaster.
Like Sylvestris, I too question the legal advice from Wright, Johnson and Mackenzie which flies in the face of the enforcement ruling by the CMA who have compelled all other such holiday businesses to offer a full & unconditional refund.
In summary there is no equality of sacrifice or of bargaining position and I might be more inclined to side with Sylvestris had LHH attempted to be even remotely conciliatory. If anything I feel they are becoming more entrenched and hostile.
There is a legal doctrine "Pactum serva" which means "keep thy contract". The gist of this that when times get tough, the true honourable and professional operators stand by their obligations, irrespective of the fact that things didn't turn out as anticipated.

I'm far from an expert in the running of private companies but I find it a bit suspect that the correspondence address for one of their secretaries is that of the solicitor who has sent their legal advice to customers. 

Sutch

ElvisU309 said:

I'm far from an expert in the running of private companies but I find it a bit suspect that the correspondence address for one of their secretaries is that of the solicitor who has sent their legal advice to customers. 

I don't think that is necessarily unusual. LHH being a small organisation probably use the legal firm to fulfil their company secretarial obligations in the same way that registered offices are often the address of the firm's accountants

Sutch

ElvisU309 said:

Is there any way to identify who the property owners are? I tried a few weeks ago to get the details of the property owners for our booking but my efforts proved fruitless. I would ask LHH to provide these but I doubt they will! I have noticed that the property is still on the LHH website. 

I received a welcoming email from the property owners when I booked (last September). I have their email address and apart from a polite comment that LHH is dealing with everything,they have ignored all my other attempts to contact them. I've also pointed out their potential contractual liability. Very disappointing.

Sylvestris

Another 1-star review posted yesterday on Trustpilot by Craig M. Copied here to maintain a permanent record as LHH Scotland will no doubt get it removed:

Having used LHH last year to book a cottage in North Uist and enjoying a trouble free holiday, we booked the same cottage again this year for two weeks around Easter.

We were unable to have our holiday because of Covid-19, we contacted them and they said that they could not let us use the property and right from the word go their stance was that they would not refund us and we should take it up with our insurance, referring us to their terms and conditions which do reference cancellation insurance. However, we hadn't cancelled the holiday and LHH would not cancel either but would only offer the chance to re-book for the next year, at the time they were quoting some time after August 2021.

I don't understand why anyone would think it ok to keep my hard earned money for 18 months. I am not investing in this company, I am paying them for a service they could not provide, and should have been refunded in full without argument.

The company continually removed the cottage owners from my emails even though the contract for the holiday is between myself and the cottage owner, not LHH.

I found them completely unhelpful, rude and arrogant from the start. I understand that they were under a lot of pressure at the time, but lets remember, I am the paying customer and this is a service industry. You live or die on your customer service.

Even when the government issued the CMA statement, they refused to change their position. Yet, rather offensively and in a baffling change of stance, we recently received marketing from them offering cottage rentals with the promise that should there be a second wave of Covid, they will refund in full. No thanks, once bitten and all that.

I will say that they eventually offered to speak to the owner to see if they would agree to a 50% refund but that was too little too late, and they never did do that.

I would strongly recommend that you book elsewhere. There are lots of companies out there that put the customer first, even when things go bad.

Before you book anything, go online and search social media (LHH took their own social media down because of the amount of complaints) and other review sites, there are a lot of disgruntled ex LHH customers out there, they cant all be wrong.

Sutch

https://www.scotsman.com/health/coronavirus/scots-holiday-firm-referred-watchdog-over-covid-19-refund-refusal-2924267?fbclid=IwAR3lgB1G4Kksa6TgOfAjs53TUhojgf9SlpfALbzrjGHgJuBJDEtnWrNm_ao