I intended to stay at a particular hotel during the month of December for 2 nights. I had booked the hotel for the 2 nights I wanted (which was about a week in advance before my travel dates) and in that same day, my plans had changed so I had to cancel. Rationally, I figured there would be no fee considering the time frame (less than 24 hours) of booking the hotel and also the time frame (about 6 days) from which the actual booking dates were held.
But of course, before I canceled, I check the "small print" to make sure there would in fact be no fee. I found that the hotel I had book my rooms for (Best Western) had a cancellation policy that would directly affect me. I had missed the "deadline" to cancel without a penalty and therefore, would have to pay for both nights if I had canceled. I basically needed to cancel before 6pm that day to avoid a fee. I had booked around 12pm and was deciding to cancel around 8pm that night. 2 hours late... But still 5 or 6 days away from my actual booked night.
I sat for a second to see if this was really serious, because I had never heard of such cancellation policy's like this. Normally, if you cancel the DAY OF you still can sometimes get by without paying, so this really boggled me.
I checked my email and realized that there was no "confirmation" of my hotel booking. This was 8 hours after I booked, and still no email. So I decided to go ahead and cancel thinking that my booking hadn't even been processed yet, I figured it would be safe.
I later decided to call hotels.com to double check. Basically, I got a woman who read to me exactly what I was reading on the website, not really listening to my particular situation. I told her I had yet to receive an actual confirmation notice, but I had already received a cancellation notice. This was ignored.
So I hung up and decided to wait it out till the morning and try again.
I called back... About 6 times before I final got someone to listen to my situation. FIRST - i spoke with a man who started out asking my basic questions like. Email address etc... Half way through me spelling my email address to him, he hung up. I called back, got hung up on several more times, then, I get another man. I explain to him my story and he suddenly says that their systems are down and that I need to call back in about 2hours.
I was a bit puzzled considering I JUST called about 5 minutes ago and was speaking to someone attempting to get my email. So I decided to call the hotel manager of the hotel I would have been staying at. I explained to her my situation and she looked me up in her database and said that the transaction hadn't even gone through and no money had been dealt with through hotels.com, so technically, my initial thinking was correct. She said she would agree to have my refund processed and I was happy with that.
So I called back hotels.com and final got a hold of a woman who sincerely sounded like she was going to help me. I told her I spoke with the manager and so the woman on the phone called the manager of the hotel to confirm. She basically told me that my refund should be processed within 5-7 business days.
I was SO happy to finally be done. So I waited... And waited... And never got my refund.
I called hotels.com back AGAIN and spoke with a woman who read exactly what the previous woman had written in her "notes" about my issue. So I know that they have verification on this. She told me that if I hadn't received my refund that I should contact my bank.
So I did. They told me that because it was through a master card, technically I can't file a "dispute" with hotels.com until 30 days after the "estimated" delivery of my refund. So I waited out my 30 days, and still no refund.
Called my bank, didn't even bother with hotels.com, and filed a dispute. I bank through USAA and they are usually excellent at helping out with situations like this. I explained, once again, my issue and they seemed to think things would get worked out considered I was apparently "awarded" a refund. Well, USAA went ahead and refunded me, but said that hotels.com can rebuttal if I didn't meet their terms and conditions. If that happened, I would get my refund taken back... Again.
So I wasn't too worried, I thought it had all worked itself out... Well 3 months later, now I get a letter in the mail from USAA stating that hotels.com is claiming i didn't meet the terms and conditions, EVEN THOUGH I contacted the actual hotel and they stayed (since it is THEIR terms not hotels.com's) that I could be refunded, I still had my refund taken away.
So this is where I am.
I am so sick of dealing with this. I want to continue, but because I NEVER received and email from hotels.com about a refund being issued (even though they told me I would get one), it's my fault.
Ridiculous, never will I use hotels.com again. Worst experience dealing with a company EVER.
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