I made an online reservation on Booking.com which stated that one child would stay free of charge. This was the bait. The hotel then implemented the switch and emailed me saying I would have to pay an additional $100 per night for the child, because the free child offer did not apply in the winter. The only problemthere were no winter terms on the online booking site or in my confirmation email and the hotel advertised the same free child policy on many other travel web sites with no limitations to particular seasons.
Over the following days I spent hours engaged in about a dozen emails with the hotel front desk and hotel managers Heinz E. Hunkeler and Jenny Hunkeler, but they refused to honor the hotel reservation agreement.
According to U.S. Consumer protection law [16 CFR PART 238], bait advertising is an alluring but insincere offer to sell a product or service which the advertiser in truth does not intend or want to sell. Even though the true facts are subsequently made known to the buyer, the law is violated if the first contact or interview is secured by deception.
Mr. Hunkeler and the hotel kept claiming they had no responsibility, since they stated my contractual partner was the online booking site. According to Booking.com terms, however, anyone making a reservation on Booking.com enters into a direct (legally binding) contractual relationship with the hotel at which you book.
The fact that Grand Hotel Kronenhof cannot be trusted is made clear on the hotels own web site: Grand Hotel Kronenhof gives no warranty and accepts responsibility for the accuracy of the material shown on its Website. (In particular, without limitation, prices, reservations, and online calculations.) We can not guarantee that the material shown on our Web site is complete and up to date at any given time.
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