Is Booking.com too scammy to trust now?

[Icanseeasquirrel]

Or have I just been unlucky? Sorry this is long. I’ve been using Booking.com for years without issues. Have used Airbnb a couple of times but I’m not a fan of them because of all the accommodation they have removed from the rental market and all the bad reviews about scams . I have excellent reviews on both sites and leave good reviews.

I have tended to book hotels on Booking.com and it’s always been fine but for an upcoming wedding needed a few rooms for a two night stay for a family wedding group so looked at whole houses.
It’s a Northern town three hours away with around six big hotels.

Attempt 1. Booked a house with booking.com. Months ago. Payment to be made a week before stay. The wedding is this weekend. Ten days ago I get a message. ‘We have been trying to reach you. The property is not available. Please cancel on the site’
Why don’t they cancel it? Anyway I cancelled it. Immediately tried to find another house and of course that one came up as available. I messaged them and they said thanks for letting us know. It’s still listed! (Same price).

Attempt 2. I found a smaller worse option. Booked. Confirmed. Sent a message querying something. They came back ‘We are not available on those dates. Booking cancelled’. Brilliant.

All the twin rooms in all the hotels are gone now. I book an expensive house on Airbnb. Immediately cancelled. ‘Sorry this listing should not show as available on those dates’.

Attempt 3. I book another option. Booking.com again. The last place in town with enough beds for us all. It’s a new listing with no reviews. Less than a week now so paid up front. Yesterday I got a message from Booking.com portal. ‘We need your email address to take the deposit as we are unable to do this on the site’. Gave my email on the site then googled this as a possible scam and yes it is a scam. Appears that the site chat is very easily hacked so messages appear to be from the hosts but aren’t. Does the accommodation even exist?!

The message said entry was via pin pad and would only be released when deposit is paid. So I try to contact the accommodation to query the scam. Don’t trust the messaging system so use the phone number. Recorded message saying to contact them via WhatsApp. It’s some agency in a different Northern town.

Booking.com ‘customer service’ is a chatbot. Completely unhelpful.

So I am not confident that after a long drive we will arrive to have anywhere to stay. I spent last night googling these issues and it’s massive. So many people scammed and unable to do anything via Booking.com to get their money back. People stranded. Fake listing. Constant hacks. Has it been enshittified so much it’s no longer usable? Maybe for hotels that have some security and oversight but not for private listings.

Anyone had this portal messaging scam but still found their accommodation exists? I guess that if we can’t get in we will have to try and contact people out of hours and gather some evidence to try and get a refund but all my searches tell me booking.com are impossible to deal with and I have no chance.

Even if nobody on here can help I wanted to send a warning. Honestly don’t use these sites if you can avoid them. I will be booking direct from now on.

We went to a music festival in Leeds a couple of weeks ago. Booked an apartment via Booking.com, as we have done many times before. Card was charged a few days before the event. On the day, left the car outside the apartment and went off to the festival, with the intention of checking in when we got back. Thought it was weird that I hadn't received any pin pad number or information from the owner. Got back that night and there was a man living in the apartment. Said he'd lived there for 5 months. Could not get hold of the landlord. So we were stranded, hundreds of miles from home, with our car outside and apartment we couldn't stay in, both having had a drink so couldn't move the car. It's certainly made me very wary of using Booking.com in future.

I've used booking.com a lot- I'm actually at Genius level 3 now, one of the perks of which is an enhanced customer service with a promise that you can get straight through to someone by phone (errrm....shouldn't that be available to all customers?)

I've had a couple of issues: one was a few years ago with an apartment in Rome- I had foolishly not noticed it only had one review (suspiciously glowing) before I booked, and 2/3 weeks before our holiday - on the date my free cancellation period ended- suddenly started getting texts from the "owner" demanding the CVC number from my card, on pain of immediate cancellation. I remember I called booking.com's finance department multiple times and they were incredibly useless and didn't really get the potential scamminess of the issue, but eventually just called general customer services and they sorted it out for me, allowing me to cancel without penalty (Although I still had to find another apartment in Rome at short notice over the Easter weekend 😬)

The other was for our trip this year, in Strasbourg- I foolishly paid upfront for an apartment, which subsequently disappeared from the listings! None of my emails to either booking.com or the host were answered, leading me to be sure we were going to arrive at an apartment that didn't exist...although I did eventually manage to get through to the host and it DID exist and we DID get our key code and manage to stay there- it just came across as dodgy as fuck!

All my other (multiple, very cheap) bookings have been fine, although I've told myself I'm going to try to steer clear of apartments from now on and stick to hotels and hostels- there's often a lack of communication until someone texts you a key code at about 3.00pm on the day, and that's pretty nervewracking. Plus these kinds of apartments should be providing homes for local people.

There customer services are awful. They owe me £300 for rooms that I ended up paying twice on through no fault of my own. Every time I call I get told that they can see my money sitting there but I need to put it all in an email; then I get somebody else replying, requesting docs ive already sent and so it goes on. This is two years old now and ive given up and just written it off.

They also rent out accommodation in Israel that has been stolen by "settlers". As do Air B n B apparently.

I try as often as possible to book directly with hotels but it's not always possible.

Claim the money back from your credit card company. We booked a apt with bars on the windows and no smoke alarms - booking.com were slow to refund so I just reported the transaction to Amex, I got a refund and they dealt with booking.com.

No I don’t think that’s what she means otherwise she wouldn’t book with booking.com or any other of those platforms. It’s always possible to book a hotel and avoid the moral dilemma.

I say this as an Airbnb host (of an annexe to our home). Airbnb is always used as the example of a bad platform taking rental properties off the market and I wonder how people think the other platforms work.

I heard a Radio 4 podcast about booking.com scams which said that most of these were via the hotel or owners' accounts being hacked. If you get a suspicious message phone the hotel on a number you've looked up independently to ask what's going on.

We mainly use Airbnb but with a host, so that we are not occupying an entire home. Have never had an issue, but always carefully check reviews and photos.

Air bnb started it though and is largely responsible for the soul being sucked out of so many places, including where I grew up. Now everyone is on it but they started it. I think that’s what she means.

I use them and never had an issue. That said I tend to stay in hotel chains which are a different beast to one off owner managed properties.

I don't see how booking.com entire home lets are any more ethical than Airbnb ones! it's the same idea! They're all taking properties out of the local housing pool. But then so are cottage agencies, and they've been around since at least the 1980s. There are far fewer guest houses and traditional B&Bs than there used to be 30 years ago - the fashion has switched away from them towards self catering units.

Anyway.... my point is that there is a lot more choice on Airbnb and the platform is designed to work on trust. if you choose carefully - check ALL the reviews, look for somewhere with more than a couple of previous lets, look at the photos on a bigger screen than your phone, see if you can identify the property and its surrounding on google maps or on other booking sites - you are less likely to come across scams or bad ones.

The only bad experiences I have had on Airbnb out of 50-odd stays are a couple of times when the property has been a bit disappointing, but in most cases that was expected & there was a reason for it - it was cheap for the area, it was the last property left at a busy time etc etc - I have never been scammed. Filter for "Guest Favourites" is another good tip, consistently well-reviewed properties.

It didn't! People have been hiring out entire rural cottages and seaside cottages through agencies or private ads for decades. I was born in the 70s and those were the only holidays we ever had. Never stayed in caravans or hotels, always self catering cottages.

Have used for years without issue - then last summer got scam e mails to pay again for a Greek villa and am currently getting repeated scam mails / whatsapp from India for a big Madrid hotel - checked with hotel - they are furious but BDC just do nothing.
Use the platform BUT do not enter into email or whatsapp conversations - it's clearly insecure

Booking.com and their competitors are absolutely fine until something goes wrong at which point they are not at all fine.

I mean this is derailing the thread now so this is my last post re this but it’s had an escalating effect everywhere from Lisbon to Barcelona to Cornwall and Wales. They have a lot to answer for and the stats bear this out.

I think Airbnb delete poor reviews - if they don’t reviewers are not being honest given the places we’ve stayed at, that’s my experience

I realised that a booking I'd made recently on booking.com wasn't with them but a third party, which worried me. I cancelled straight away and booked with the hotel direct instead. Things seem to have changed on there.

I’ve never had an issue, and have used them
loads for years. I had heard resolving issues is a pain but never had any.

I have used booking.com for many years - when it works, it works very well. But when it doesn’t work, their customer service is appalling. It has made me think again - I try to book directly now when possible. They get a good cut of the hotel charges so they should fund a decent customer service, but I think they want to make as much profit as possible.

Well, i totally cursed that!

Halifax recently changed my CC, i updated Booking payment info, which they applied to 3 out of 4 bookings BUT not the 4th one, so it was cancelled, spoke to Booking and they offered no apology or solution.... xxxxing useless.

I have used them for years with no issue and they helped get refunds in covid. This year I have just booked hotels in Sri Lanka with them and no issues so far apart from one small hotel which has like 6 rooms I got a message through booking system with details of booking (like exact room, stay, persons who owns details, correct address) saying go into our portal with this pin and number and enter more details. I started to do that though only address our names, home address, e-mail and phone - it was asking for passport details and photos as well. Then had to message property and lady told me then that was a scam. I suspect they already had the details on us I entered but is concerning. I do check for each hotel to find their own website. I also tend to book no prepayment, pay at hotel. The trouble is for smaller places in Sri Lanka there's often no other way though I think you pay once there mostly in cash so not that risky. I'm not concerned for this trip but would be wary about messaging system.

Thanks for all responses to my venting. Yes I do mean I feel bad about supporting any sites that contribute to the problem of some places having loads of holiday rentals but no long term rentals for people that live there.
I tried booking whole properties as it’s a busy weekend in the town - including the large wedding I’m attending and there are no twin rooms left in any hotels.
I’ve started a charge back claim for the money I’ve already been charged and have booked double rooms in a hotel. Will be fun bunking in with my adult son I’m sure!
I actually got a message tonight asking for an on site deposit for the flat I’d booked and just replied that I was not confident the property existed and couldn’t risk it after the attempts to get me to pay off the site.
I’ve cancelled my card which is a pain. And deleted the app and the data.
Re the last post about Sri Lanka. I actually went there earlier this year and had a long chat with a hotelier who was moaning about Booking.com and upset about their business model that caused him grief and cost him money.
Glad to agree with everyone else who books direct now. These scalping companies don’t act with sufficient responsibility considering the huge amounts of money they extract from the properties and their customers.

We have used booking.com.for years without issue until very recently

We booked accommodation and paid directly as per terms and conditions on booking.com

I then.had a second message asking for payment - this made me question if it was genuine.
A new review had appeared saying it was a scam.

Booking.com insisted it was a genuine property but I wasn't convinced but nothing we could do but turn up and see.
Property didn't exist and we then had to find alternative accommodation..we luckily found something close. Raised with bank and booking.com but don't expect we will get the money back.

I had problems booking direct in covid and getting refunds from places that were theoretically fully refundable. Took a year in some cases. So now I do it case by case and for some places in Sri Lanka there isn't an option to book directly. They do charge around a third the fee but also advertise and its a fairly standard advertising sales rate and if anyone doesn't like it they are free not to use it.

We also had to cancel our Sri Lanka holiday for Easter (Emirates flights) and having booked using Booking.com I could get everything fully refunded as I had booked the free cancellation no prepayment rates. I tried to book one hotel directly rather than Booking.com and got told their website was down and currently could not be fixed. Another does not offer direct booking. Obviously if you are going to big chain hotels you can book direct.

Just as an update. I had cancelled the two places I’d booked on booking.com for later this year and tried to book an alternative direct with property. Was impossible. Clicking on the links to contact the hotel directly took me to booking or Expedia or other sites I’d never heard of.
So I rebooked somewhere last night after setting up an Expedia account. Had to go through it twice as the site crashed but eventually booked a night for £150. Checked the reservation on the app and it’s showing amount due on arrival is £300.
Checked I hadn’t accidentally booked two rooms or two nights then spent 15 min with a chat bot and eventually a human. The human needed a screen shot. Uploaded that and he just said. Yeah that happens sometimes. But it’s definitely £150. It will be fine.
So now I have to wait and see if they charge me the double amount accidentally.
Everything has gone to shit. Because we all use the sites the humans aren’t employed for that job anymore. Bit like online shopping meaning there is nothing in the shops!

Have never had a single issue with them, but I only book hotels where you can check on Google Maps that they do actually exist.