I am writing to you to ask for your assitance with solving an issue we are having with Orbitz.com who are charging us for a mistake they made in booking a hotel room for us.
Approximately a month ago, my wife and I booked a hotel room through Orbitz.com. We waited for our confirmation email to arrive before setting off for the beach. When we did not get a confirmation email, we called them and spoke to a "customer service" rep and told them that we have booked but received no confirmation. She corrected the issue and we had our confirmation but we had to spell every last letter of the conversation to her and she did not appear to know what she was doing at the time. We enjoyed our stay at the beach and at the hotel check-in, there seemed nothing wrong with our one room.
On our next credit card statement, we noticed that Orbitz had charged us twice for the same day at the same hotel for two separate bookings. We called them on multiple times waiting on hold for hours. Eventually when we got through to a real person and explained that they had made an error, a "customer service" rep informed us that we had booked two rooms on two separate occasions and that is why we were being charged twice. Despite our protests and explanations of their errors, we were told that we "had better pay".infuriated at the injustice, we called our credit card company and informed them that this was a fradulent claim for payment by Orbitz and that we had not ordered the service twice. The credit card company agreed to reverse the second charge and they were going to ask the Orbitz team to contact us.
A week later, I received a call from a "customer service" rep who had absolutely no tact or verbal skills. She persisted to inform me that I had made a mistake and I had better pay for the charge. This rep continued to inform me of how "the system works over here". I informed her that despite my strong English accent, I knew exactly how I need to pay for services I purchase and that I was not paying for an error the Orbitz service rep made (it was clear that the original rep had booked a second room in error instead of fixing any issues that may have existed. This may not have occurred if the rep was trained and knew what she was doing). After some un-polite conversation, we ended the interaction.
Today, I received a note from a debt collection agency asking for the money. We did nothing wrong (except using Orbitz!) and now we are faced with a debt of $139 or an issue with our credit history because Orbitz made an error. I have impecable credit history, both my wife and I are professional people with highly desirable positions and we are both educated above first degree level but we are frustated that Orbitz cannot admit to their error, fix it and move on. It seems that you cannot even speak to a real person unless you hold on for hours. We are never using a internet based travel agency like Orbitz again.
Please help me to get this corrected - you might be able to suggest other avenues we could try to have Orbitz correct their error.
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