Booking.com ignoring me

jodavies

The original hotel was fully booked and said our reservation had been cancelled. They said as we had booked through booking.com out contract was with them. Booking.com verbally agreed to pay for the only other hotel room in a travelable distance which was £500. They followed this up on an email and agreed to pay for it. 

Now I am trying to claim this back I can’t get hold of anyone to ask and the emails to the customer support keep asking for booking defences that were never included in my booking confirmation. I don’t know how to proceed and considering legal action 

CKhalvashi

onashoestring said:

jodavies said:

I didn’t know that was the case for debit card. 

The fault was booking.com but they are saying it was the hotel. 

Booking.com have stated they would pay for the alternative accommodation but now I’m trying to claim that money back no one will give me a sensible reply 

Did you also book the alternative accommodation through booking.com?

If there is a problem with your booking  and you contacted booking.com at the time they usual offer to assist you in finding alternative accommodation through booking.com at no extra cost to yourself . 

If there was nothing available through booking.com and they authorised you to make your own arrangements , have you kept the e-mails or screenshots of your conversations with booking.com. 

That is not my experience with them.

The one time I've had accommodation with a problem (boiler not working at all when it was -7 outside in Ukraine) they stated bluntly that we need to book only on their platform, pay any difference and seek a refund from the original provider as they are 'not a booking provider, simply a software supplier' (which wasn't my legal interpretation as they had processed the payment in this case).

They relented (but only with an account credit, we accepted this knowing we'd eat through it very quickly) when presented with a bill for about £40 (including money for gas that wasn't explained on taking the accommodation, the accommodation was sourced elsewhere) and threatened with court action however. We've since found a reliable accommodation supplier in that city but still use Booking 5-6 times a year, so presumably it was cheaper for them to simply pay than lose us to another supplier.

jodavies said:

The original hotel was fully booked and said our reservation had been cancelled. They said as we had booked through booking.com out contract was with them. Booking.com verbally agreed to pay for the only other hotel room in a travelable distance which was £500. They followed this up on an email and agreed to pay for it. 

Now I am trying to claim this back I can’t get hold of anyone to ask and the emails to the customer support keep asking for booking defences that were never included in my booking confirmation. I don’t know how to proceed and considering legal action 

Sending correspondence through their systems with words to the effect of 'letter before action' and a 28 day deadline to pay before court action 'may' be pursued may assist greatly here.

Forwarding the original e-mail to them asking about payment may also assist you, likely in combination with the above. A majority of their Customer Service is outsourced and in the case of anything specialised from experience this doesn't generally work.

jodavies

Thanks for your help. They won’t pay the amount they agreed to and I am now going to have to progress to small claims court. I can’t believe they are being like this when they put in writing that they would cover the cost before we booked it. 

Does anyone know if, being a European based company, they have to abide by UK court rulings? 

Caz3121

from their terms and conditions section A19

1. To the extent permitted by mandatory local (consumer) law, these Terms and our services will be governed by Dutch law (for accommodations, flights or attractions) or English law (for car rentals and private/public transport).

2. To the extent permitted by mandatory local (consumer) law, any dispute will exclusively be submitted to the competent courts in Amsterdam (for accommodations, flights or attractions) or England and Wales (for car rentals and private/public transport).