booking.com has become incompetent & dishonest. Not worth any discount perks.

pcatpurrs

Today, I've experienced the nadir of booking.com's incompetence and dishonesty.  Twice.  

1st instance:  trying to change a business-class flight dates because of illness.   After hours of being kept waiting - and being charged a price a third as much again as listed on their website for the date change, PLUS having to make a second payment for $ 0.04 because they had incompetently billed me for the wrong price - booking.com finally do the change.  I think.  

Not so.  No new ticket, despite having paid.  Nothing.  

It turns out that because their agent had logged out of the chat while I was making all these payments, the system registered no date change.  Despite payment having been taken.  It took another call and an hour more to sort that out, finally. 

2nd instance: trying to cancel a hotel booking for the same reason of illness, in order to re-book fresh later dates.  (The booking did not allow for a date change.  I had to cancel).  The property itself, of which I'm an old customer, wrote to me to say they would waive the cancellation fee but had not heard from booking.com.  

Booking.com then wrote to me saying that because the booking was managed by an anonymous "partner company" they could not change dates or cancel the booking.  I wrote back, attaching a copy of the hotel's offer to waive the fee.  

Booking.com then sent a no-reply letter, with no reference to the anonymous "partner company" saying they had contacted the property who had refused to waive the cancellation fee.   A statement clearly belied by the property's own statement.

I have asked them to explain what is going on and to waive the cancellation fee as the property itself has agreed to do.   Silence.

I'm a Genius level 3 customer of booking.com - not that that makes any difference to them, just that I am an old, very frequent customer.  

NO MORE.   I travel constantly.  I shall never use booking.com again and advise everyone else to watch out.  Something has happened at the company - new management?  a debt crisis? - that has changed them from a customer friendly outfit into a bunch of incompetent dishonest fools.  At our expense.  Discount perks or not they're not worth it.   AVOID.

flaneurs_lobster

I've had a few annoyances with booking.com in the last couple of years (lost booking, price mismatches, double billing), enough that I now use them as another site for checking out hotels in an unfamiliar area or looking for flight availability.

Any bookings are made direct. Never did enough business with them to be elevated to Platinum/5*/Priority or whatever they call their loyalty scheme so not missing any discount levels.

MyRealNameToo

You say this is today? 

I wouldnt expect a ticket to arrive instantly, especially on an alteration via a third party. Systems used by airlines are archaic and it's not all straight through processing. With the agents we use most tickets come through in 6 hours but at peak times it can be next day. 

It may come as a surprise but there are circa 5,000 travel agencies in the UK plus a load more overseas. They dont go to the 17.5m hotels world wide and negotiate with them individually. In reality travel is a many layered supply chain with wholesale firms in the middle that you will never see or hear of but it means a travel agent can book with millions of hotels and not just the ones they've individually contracted with. 

What I dont get is why are you using a middleman to book a hotel you are regular at? When I travelled extensively with work the hotels I were a regular at would always do a much better deal on a direct booking than their website, an agent like booking.com or a proper decent agent. 

Online travel agents like booking.com are ok when things go smoothly, they work on small margins and it's a volume game. They tend to fall apart when things dont go to plan but then thats why most corporates dont use these types of firms for their booking but instead use a real agency which may be a little more expensive but are much better when things go wrong. 

If you want cheap and cheerful expect more pain when things go wrong. 

Nebulous2

I've used booking.com a lot in the last two years, and I've had some good deals with them. 

I've also body swerved them at times. Particularly for accommodation. 

After finding a promising property, I've several times found that the price was cheaper on the hotels own website, than on booking.com.  

Where you do need to watch is that you are comparing like for like. Booking.com often allows late cancellations, going direct may not. 

I had a difficult time with an agent during covid, after being locked down away from home. Since then I've almost always booked flights direct with the airline. I'm willing to pay a premium for that.