Last week I made an honest mistake by booking a hotel in italy for 1 month earlier on a non-refundable booking via booking.com. the hotel has marked it as no show.
I was very tired when I made the booking and I know I shouldn't have done it.
The hotel still have availability on the correct date I need but it's 5 times more expensive! Extremely big difference between May and June bookings!
What are the chances the hotel will refund my money?
Feel like crying now!
Agreed. No chance. Should have tried sorting it out before the date booked. Then you could perhaps get credited the amount you paid to book at another date.
Too bad. Always triple check details like dates and amounts before clicking Confirm when booking flights, rooms, concerts, etc. I made a similar mistake on Booking.com but fortunately no payment at that point so I could amend the booking immediately afterwards.
Email them and explain, worth a shot. You'll never know uf you don't try right?
I guess the chance would be higher if you are re-booking for another date though.
I would try calling rather than email. You never know your luck.
i got my money back on a flight that was non refundable, contact them immediately
Yeah I did this with flights once. I had to eat it.
Oh no, my sympathies. Mistakes like this can be made by any one of us. Triple check next time.
I can't see you getting any sort of refund, but maybe negotiating some sort of "pity rate" from the hotel if you talk to them. Maybe. Though I wouldn't count on anything. Good luck!
What cheap charlie said…
First call booking.com and see if they can do anything they might say yes or know or talk to the hotel.
In the future AND FOR ANYONE ELSE using booking.com I highly highly recommend booking the refundable/changeable option. It's normally only $100 more and is exactly for situations like this.
The price difference between May and June would be big due to holidays in June/July.
Have you looked at other options around that time?
I agree with what you have said.
9/10 times it's best to go through the hotel. However in the case of my most recent trip, the hotel website was terrible, it kept saying there was no availability so I just used booking.com
It also allowed me to select the 'pay later' option so I could pay with my 28 degrees card when it arrives.
I noticed yesterday that for a place I stayed at, on their Tripadvisor listing, it now has not just the OTA links but also a direct link.
just to clarify , booking.com and the like are an online booking engine/aggregator not online travel agents .
If you book with a travel agent they can get the same rate majority of the time booking thru the hotel as they will pay the agent a commission
directly and it doesnt mean you pay more. Sometimes you might get a better rate it is far from the norm nowadays unless you are talking about staying at 2-3star places .
a travel agent is someone you can talk to , a booking engine is something you book thru , booking.com , expedia etc etc they are a booking engine , if you could do a live chat or something like that then ok maybe call them an online travel agent but if you are doing all the work and making the booking its a website allowing you to make a booking and making a commission from it . Calling this kind of thing an online travel agent is just offensive to REAL travel agents .
The hotel still have availability on the correct date I need but it's 5 times more expensive!
Surely you knew when you booked that the holiday period would be more. A cynical person might think you're trying to pull the obvious scam here.
Sigh…..18/5 vs 18/6. $200 vs $1000 per night
If it's not 5 times difference, I would be willing to pay extra if the hotel allow me to do so.
I have emailed booking.com. Hopefully miracle happens…..
Sighhhhhhh
Made the mistake, if you call booking.com within 24 hours and let them know they will call the hotel. The hotel can choose to refund you if they wish, this happened when I was in foreign countries and accidentally booked a hotel in the wrong location…
I have done this myself, but I phoned Booking.com straight away and they altered it for me.
I think you were exaggerating when you say the hotel was 5X more expensive though!
I'm not exaggerating. Hotels in venice is crazy :(
oh hey we'll be in venice in july as well! Yes hotels are crazy expensive right now unless you don't mind travelling from the mainland.
Check out airbnb availability for a room.
Air BnB - but sometimes if it's only one night the fact that you may not be able to check in and out whenever and leave your bag -plus the cleaning fees make hotels or actual bnbs better.
Have you looks at Lido or Mestre? The public transport runs all night so it's not like you have to leave with all the day trippers- and to both these places it's about 20- 25 min to Venice itself. The transport is included in the actv travel pass you should buy anyway.
My husband and son just checked out of a hotel/BnB In mestre today. it was 12 minutes by bus from there to the Santa Lucia station on Venice. Well worth it for the huge difference in price. Also the buses they were catching from Milan and to Naples -came and went from mestre so it was easier to drop their bags off in mestre than struggling through Venice with luggage.
I had a similar thing happen to me last month, except I realised before the date. It was a 5 night booking in Spain, I simply emailed booking.com and explained my mistake and went on about how loyal a customer I am blah blah blah
They contacted the hotel who were fortunately happy to let me change the dates and pay the difference
Fingers crossed for you!
Non-refunadable, there are your chances right there.
The hotel are not at fault due to your own mistakes.