Should the hotel offer a full, partial or no refund due to 'outbooking'?

[Trifleorbust]

Bit of a saga!

Me, DH and DD (under 1 so in a travel cot) booked a double room in a well-known hotel chain for one night while visiting family. The room cost around £100 and was spacious with a double bed. The hotel has a swimming pool.

We arrived and went to check in. We were told by the hotel receptionist that, due to a fault in their online booking system, the hotel had overbooked and they had been forced to 'outbook' us to another local hotel. This hotel was in the next village (about a mile away) and was prepared to 'honour' our booking by charging the same amount as the booked room cost.

I was not pleased but thought well, these things happen. I asked what the replacement room would have cost otherwise, as obviously we wouldn't be happy to lose our room, travel to a different hotel and pay more than the room was worth. She couldn't answer this and just said they had said they would match the price.

When we arrived at the new hotel it was a very small room with a double bed, not at all suitable for a couple and a baby. The manager told me it was really a single and was the last room they had available. The booking price for a single room is £79. He also told me the hotel chain does this regularly, so not a fault with the booking system at all.

I was pretty unhappy by this point and called with my complaint. The manager was polite. She offered to match the new price of the new room, but because it was a double bed she was looking at the double room price and she was actually only offering a £7 discount, so I said this wasn't good enough. I reiterated that she had been disingenuous about the booking issue and that I felt it was all round very poor service. We were stuck in a room we never would have booked and were being asked to overpay for it. She then offered to send a taxi to allow us to use the hotel pool, but I said again this wasn't good enough - we have a baby and are not going to spend our evening getting taxis. She then offered a 20% discount; this made no difference to the price.

I have said no and I think they need to do better than this to make it good.

AIBU?

Hi. I used to work at a large hotel chain and unfortunately had to book out on occasion. The standard was to try and arrange a similar quality hotel and we would pay for transport to the new hotel and cover the room cost and breakfast for the customer for the inconvenience. This was an airport hotel and the procedure was the same for any other hotels booking out to us. I think you should keep pushing and insist they cover your costs, it's their issue and you've been inconvenienced.

YANBU, they should cover the costs. I used to stay in a hotel for work that regularly overbooked. They know what they are doing, and it's bad service.