Any booking.com experts able to explain?

[Luelare]

For all hotels I'm looking at (in London) the price difference between breakfast included and not included doesn't make any sense. The difference is never just the cost of the breakfast for two people for the number of nights you're staying. See example screenshot. From what I can see, there's literally no other difference between the rooms than the £17/day/pp breakfast (so for 4 nights = £68*2 = £136 in total). Yet the price difference is £300?! Is it just a scam or am I not getting something here?

I agree it doesn't make sense, the difference in price is often due to the cancellation policy (flexible or pre-payment) but that's bonkers.

Your maths is off (it's 4 people having 4 breakfasts = £272). But it's still more expensive if breakfast is included.

Very weird! I use booking .com a lot and haven't ever experienced that.

Isn’t your booking for 4 people so £17 x 4 is £68 which is £272 for 4 days?

I use booking.com quite often and this is not a problem I have experienced. I would guess that there is an issue in the backend price set up for one of the rooms or breakfast.

I just checked, out of curiosity, and it's not affecting all London hotels, so you should be able to find one not affected. For most, I can get a better deal booking breakfast included, compared to the breakfast price quoted. This was a search for two rooms, for 2 adults, 2 children.