Booking.com free cancellation!

[CountryLovingGirl]

Hi,
I booked a couple of hotels with Booking.com for a short stay in September (via Booking.com). Both came with free cancellation so I cancelled the one I wasn't using. Anyway, my credit card bill came today and both have charged me the full amount. Who do I contact - the hotel or Booking.com?

£250 so a lot to lose!

This happened to me too. Is the credit card charge from the hotel itself? If so you have to contact them. They refunded me in the end but less £4 the original amount, I couldn't be bothered to argue but won't be using them again!

The hotel won't have your card details if you didn't go there, so I'd say contact booking.com 😀 are you definitely sure it was a free cancellation?? I only realised recently that not all of them are cancelable!

I've recently stayed with booking.com and it was supposed to be payment on arrival. The hotel actually put a 'hold' on the card for the full amount a couple of months before so they can go near your card details. There was nothing to say they would do this and it didn't matter to us that it was held before but they can get your card details.

I've used booking.com a couple of times recently and it looked like there were different options. The website quite often says something like 'rooms from £150 with free cancellation' and then when you click on 'book now' you can have the £150 if you pay upfront (presumably to be refunded if you cancel) but if you don't want to pay until you arrive, the price goes up to £170. Is it possible that you've accidentally chosen the pay in advance option?

Not all hotels are free cancellation. You'll need to contact both and check booking agreements.

I got my money back when it happened to me as it turned out booking.com had failed to make it clear about cancellation fees - it should have said fees applied for cancellation and it didn't. I often need to cancel trips (illness) so always check I have free cancellation.

The hotel when contacted pointed out I'd have been better booking flexible with them as using booking.com with them is never refundable due to costs of being on their website.