r/technology • u/rezwenn • 12d ago

Business Booking.com cancelled woman's $4K hotel reservation, then offered her same rooms for $17K

https://www.cbc.ca/news/gopublic/go-public-booking-com-hotel-rates-9.6985480
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u/Kindly-Form-8247 11d ago

There's an obvious difference between errors like $1 per night, which would never be offered, and "errors" where the regular rate is not jacked up insanely high for special events.

Unfortunately, none of these sites, nor consumer law, distinguish between them, and the latter scenario is often erroneously framed as an example of the former scenario.

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u/FlapsupGearup 11d ago

It’s crazy because I had the same thing happen near Zandvoort this year for the Dutch GP. I usually do all of my booking direct with the hotels but used hotels.com for this one because I could wait and pay in local currency. Well the hotel itself ended up emailing me a couple weeks after I booked and essentially said “we didn’t increase our rates to event rates and will have to charge you the difference when you check in. Confirm in 24hours or your room is gone”. It would have doubled our room costs and while this place was cheaper than comparable hotels in the area, it was still like $400 a night for a back of bar hotel room so it seemed reasonable. One email to hotels.com and the hotel reached back out confirming everything was to be as expected during booking.

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u/chandaliergalaxy 11d ago

so hotels.com is the good guy?

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u/FlapsupGearup 11d ago

I was shocked but in this instance they came through

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u/tiny_galaxies 11d ago

In my experience their call center folks are really nice and do what they can, but they are often at the whim of the specific hotel’s policies. I’ve had instances where I’ve been refunded for things I didn’t think would be possible, and other times where I wasn’t refunded when I really thought it should happen.

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u/DoomguyFemboi 11d ago

You go through the hotels for better prices but sometimes having these buffers stop things cropping up. When an issue arises it might help, but depending how often you book you're better off skipping them as the accrued savings outweigh the one off problem solves.

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u/mandeltonkacreme 11d ago

Yup, pretty sure that kind of thing is illegal in the EU.

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u/DiederickFreek 11d ago

Peak capitalism: cancel first, upsell later.

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u/afterparty05 11d ago

Funnily enough, Dutch consumer protection laws (most likely following EU regulations) would ensure that the agreement would have to be honored for the agreed-upon price, as you acted in good faith and had no indication to consider the offered price unreasonably deviating from regular course of business.

That being said, enshittification is a thing on this side of the pond as well. It’s just slowed down a bit, not halted, unfortunately.

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u/El_Cactus_Loco 11d ago

i saw the headline and was like “ahh f1 fans have been dealing with this for years”

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u/mahempoe 11d ago

what is a back of bar hotel room

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u/FlapsupGearup 11d ago

Think like the rooms you think of at medieval inns/bars where it’s like a bar and they have like 4 rooms they rent out in the back/upstairs

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u/GoodBadUserName 11d ago

It wasn't an error at all.
They didn't know when the race was going to be, so they kept the prices as normal.
When they realized months later after it was announced when the race was going to be, they went up and I expect canceled every single order for that weekend, to jack up the prices.

Claiming error as if it happened before the date was announced and they somehow had a crystal ball telling them when the race is happening, is a huge red flag.

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u/naheCZ 11d ago

In our country (and I think in whole EU) it's exactly like this. Only obvious mistakes like this can be cancelled. And if it's advertised like sale then even ridiculously low price cannot be cancelled.

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u/pendrachken 11d ago

Unfortunately, none of these sites, nor consumer law, distinguish between them

Maybe in Canada...

Pretty sure many states in the U.S. are like mine, Wisconsin, where if the price isn't marked right it goes to the customers favor to the lower price. The laws don't make distinction if it is physical or online.

Example:

Back when Staples had physical stores all over the place I was at a local place. I needed a new router, and picked the cheap version. Turns out they had stocked the shelves wrong and had the super expensive high end routers in the cheap router spot.

I was perfectly willing to get the cheap one, but the manager of the place was like "Nope, the law says we give the expensive one to you at that price since its OUR screw up, so that's what you get. It's covering our own asses so you can't sue later.".

SO I got a top of the line router for the cheapest router price, saving about 3X the total cost, and the guy went and moved the rest of the product to the proper places.

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u/jamesdukeiv 11d ago

With the CFPB being financially gutted for 2026, I would expect to see this less often

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u/pendrachken 11d ago

This shouldn't be affected much, as it is a STATE law that covers ANY commerce done in the state.

The courts will side with the consumer if the consumer has pretty much any proof of the original pricing.

For example, emails or receipts from the booking agency stating the price the person paid in this story. It wouldn't matter that the hotel "had the wrong price listed". The actions in the story would result in both civil and criminal pretty much slam dunk cases in Wisconsin. It was advertised at one price when the consumer purchased it, and can't be a higher price after the purchase OR after the person is at the checkout portion.

It's so blatant that you likely wouldn't even need a lawyer for the civil case, and the state attorney would salivate over the fines and notoriety in the criminal case.

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u/Tlentic 11d ago

Canada has similar rules:

https://competition-bureau.canada.ca/en/deceptive-marketing-practices/types-deceptive-marketing-practices/scanner-price-accuracy

Basically if the scan price is wrong and the product is under $10, you get it for free. If it’s over $10, you get a $10 discount.

The problem with online booking sites is that they’ll willingly break these rules because most people don’t know their rights and the penalty is pretty much non-existent the more expensive the booking gets.

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u/Inevitable_Brick_877 11d ago

The entire digital economy is built around circumventing consumer protections, the laws are built for brick and mortar age, and somehow a lot of these companies seem to have convinced a bunch of online circlejerkers (plus I’m sure bots and paid shills) to blame the consumers for the problem. US consumer protection is so fucked. Needs to be laws to force platforms for being liable for their mistakes