r/Bookingcom

I booked a non-refundable hotel for 4 nights, but first night is hell and I want to get refound.

Issues:

- smell of cigaretts in mi room
- promised AC can’t be turned on
- NOISES! I hear sound of “drilling” every 10 minutes - found out it’s old door when opening
- furniture being dragged around the room above me at MIDNIGHT

I’ve asked the hotel for a refund for remaining 3 unused nights, but they said it’s non-refundable.

What are my chances of getting a refund in this situation? Has anyone successfully received a refund for a non-refundable booking, because the hotel didn’t provide acceptable conditions?

Thank you for any advices

I used booking.com to book 5 hotels in Italy for August. When I was looking for hotels I did search up if booking.com was legit and the safari search results were saying it was, and it is a very popular website i’ve heard about many times before, so I trusted it. However after I booked I read horror stories on reddit about how they don’t actually book you in the hotel or give you a false address, etc. so now i’m worried i’m going to show up and there won’t be a room for me as my reservation did not go through. My other worry is that one of the reservations I booked was on booking.com but through a partner website…. should I be worried this one especially isn’t going to have my reservation? The other hotels I got a confirmation through booking.com but not the partner one which I can understand but I emailed that hotel on Thursday to see if my reservation is in the system but still haven’t heard back. i’m a bit worried about this all now…

oh and also when i was booking each place on booking.com i was looking at the reviews and they were all good so i assumed each place was legit and no one has had any issues in the past

I’ve arrived to Paris some 2 hours ago, went to my hotel where i booked 7 night stay on Booking only to find the lobby literally full of people and receptionist who asked me “did you reserve through Booking.com in the last 24 to 48 hours” “yes?” “That wasn’t us, we were hacked”. Everyone is stranded and all the hotels around us were full due to this. I had to catch a cab and go to a different location, just to pay for one night in person.

Here’s the thing. The woman working said there are surely OVER ONE HUNDRED (100!) people who showed up today, despite them having no available room!

I’ve filed a complaint like everyone else did but I am aware this might take a while and my money is gone. My question is, is booking even safe to use right now in Paris? Or was this just this hotels fault?

Hi, I upgraded my phone to a new Pixel. I can no longer login to my Booking account via my mobile. I have a laptop that still works and I am logged in but I normally use my mobile to book when on the road. Going to "Contact Customer Support" is end endless loop that goes nowhere. No support email no phone number.

Does anyone have a customer support number in US or some support email?

Does anyone know what would cause this? Me and my friend booked a room overnight for our layover... I got an email saying my reservation was successfully cancelled but i never cancelled it... No one has access to my account... I contacted the property and they say all they see is it was cancelled by the guest... I called booking. Com customer service and they contacted the property to try and reinstate the reservation... Other than that they are no help they say there system says it was cancelled by the guest, but like i said i wasn't even in the app when i got that email saying it was cancelled...

I had registered 2 adults, but additional bedsheets were taken out and used.

How do you handle unregistered guests on booking?
Is there any way to block them from booking again?

Has anyone else experienced a “ghost host” scam on Booking.com?
This is the second time I’ve been scammed through Booking.com. I made a reservation, arrived at the location in the evening with my daughter after taking an Uber, and discovered there was no property, no street number, and no way to check in. We stood in the rain for over an hour trying to find the address while repeatedly calling and texting the host. There was absolutely no response.
Out of curiosity, I texted the host from a different phone number, and they immediately replied, asking, “Who is this?” But when I contacted them from my own phone number, they already knew my name and reservation details. That convinced me this was a deliberate scam.
I had no choice but to book another accommodation through Airbnb at the last minute, which ruined the start of our vacation and cost me even more money.
What has been even more frustrating is Booking.com’s response. Customer service keeps saying they have to contact the property and wait several days for a response before they can do anything. If the property is clearly fraudulent, why is Booking.com still waiting for the scammer to respond? This happened to me before, and I never received a refund from Booking.com. The first time, I only got my money back because my credit card company successfully processed a chargeback.
Now I’m going through the same process again.
Has anyone else experienced this? Were you able to get a refund? Is there a way to escalate a complaint beyond the regular customer service line or reach someone who can actually resolve these cases?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I don’t want anyone else to go through what my daughter and I experienced

I work at a hotel, and anytime I have had a problem, the problem has always been with booking.com. They refuse to talk directly to hotel staff and will only talk through email. The problem is they never send the email, or they send it to the wrong one. I had an experience today where a guest was on the phone with them, and they handed the phone to me to talk to them, and the customer service person refused to talk to me. They said it was against policy. The guest even tried to ask them what email they were sending the email to, and they refused to talk.

Never use booking.com

The very first time I ever used Booking.com, to get a holiday apartment on Roman Road in Bow neighborhood of London, turned iut to be a scam. The day we arrived in London I was messaged that the "Property won't be available due to an emergency repair". The Host said they "can move me to another property for today and move me into my original booking tomorrow", there was no answer when I called. Hours later and several long calls with Booking.com customer support I got a refund, but now I have to book accommodation for my family same-day! Booking.com give no help at all, they say they will "cover the difference" but only up-to 51 quid (worthless) and paid in vouchers after my vacation is over. Needless to say, avoid booking.com, they take no care to vet the hosts and give no help when scammers strike.

Hi, I made a booking for Hotel Nou Dalt Muntaya, Mallorca for 21-26th July 2026. My money (680 euros) was debited from the account but I got an error showing "Something went wrong" on the booking.com app. I did not get any confirmation from Booking.com nor even an acknowledgement that the transaction failed and the money will be reversed. 

I tried contacting the customer support number - and since I don't have a confirmation number, the AI agent can't authenticate my booking and refuses to help any further asking me to contact email support.

When I try to contact on this customer service via message, I was told to call the customer support number.

In one of the emails, you had mentioned a local number to call for India and that number is definitely hacked because that person started asking me for my debit card number, started contacting me on whatsapp, asking for my CVV, etc. So I cut that call.

In the customer email responses, you ask me to respond back with booking details but those emails are no-reply emails so they get bounced.

I have checked with the hotel reception already and they haven't received any booking under my name there yet. So the transaction is stuck at Booking.com's side. Please help me through a Human agent as I am tired of being made to run around in circles by AI support on your platform. And help me at the earliest as this is a Honeymoon booking.

I have tried raising the request through the Booking.com website but I keep getting the same AI emails asking me to share my dates, hotel name, confirmation number, etc. But I have already shared it and I don't have the confirmation number. The contact number you shared also can't help because they need my confirmation number to authenticate but since I don't have that, it keeps asking me to write an email. This is super frustrating! Please help me.

So I booked this place on booking and we were refused fresh bedsheets and towels after three days - our total was four. It’s summer and we have a toddler with us. The host said that their accommodation is more like an Airbnb and they don’t provide hotel services but offered to give fresh bedsheets with an extra cost - she also mentioned that they say it on their accommodation description but didn’t see anything specific. I don’t think that fresh bedsheets and towels are considered ‘hotel services’ - unless I asked them to change them themselves.

She also said that they provide a washing machine. I washed some bedsheet but their drying rack was pretty cheap and fell a few times, but also did not have any pegs. So I had to rewash the bedsheets as they fell on floor and got stained…

I’ve stayed at both booking and Airbnb places and they either offered fresh bedsheets themselves or not refused fresh bedsheets after a few days. What are people’s experiences and what do people think?

Basically, I've never used Booking.com and I'm just trying to use it now. I'm going though the registration process and I get a message that says 'unlock account' and then just a message that says 'account disabled for security reasons'. And to contact customer support. I tried to contact customer support but they are, of course, utterly useless.

Anybody else having trouble accessing their booking details? When I click on a booking, it sends me to account dot booking dot com and gives me a "you need permission to access this booking" message. It shows that I'm currently signed into the account that booked the flight, and when I "verify with email" it goes through then brings me right back to this page. And there's nobody I can contact!

The phone number gives me AI customer service that can't do anything. The chat only works if I can sign into the account dot booking side of the website. This is making me nervous about my upcoming trip. I have another hotel to book and there's no way I'm doing it through booking at this point. Any advice on how to interact with an actual human?

The property messaged me directly to complete my reservation with a link : https://stayinroma2026.com

Clicking the link reveals another URL: https://booking.stayinroma2026.net/UMZYBIEPW, the website mimics that of the official booking.com website

I have booked an apartment in Rome from the 6th to 10th of July. The apartment was probably one of the first search results that popped up. After reserving through booking.com, the property then messaged me with a link to complete the reservation. I went through the provided link which had a another payment screen. Thinking this was standard practice, I put in my card details but for some reason it said "card not supported". I had to try 3 different cards until it worked. Its not until I used Revolut where the payment almost went through, then I realised the amount that was about to be deducted from the Revolut app did not match the actual price of the apartment. Thats when I realised something might be a bit fishy. I cancelled the payment and tried to chat with booking.com customer service to try and verify the legitimacy of the property. They said they will update me via email once the property reaches back to them.

In the meantime, I would like your opinions on this. Am I right for being skeptical? As the reservation is non-refundable (although no money has gone out of my account yet), do you think I should try to get a free cancellation? Please advise!

I booked and fully paid for a hotel in April, today, 7 days before my trip, the hotel contacted me and said they overbooked due to an technical error. They want to offer me alternative accomodation at their sister hotel which is in the same location with same stars, but has worse ratings, worse beach and worse food. Otherwise they said that I can cancel. What makes this even worse is the fact that this is my honeymoon trip. I am waiting for booking to confirm the issue. What is the usual outcome in issues like this?

Hello guys I will be traveling in Rome in some months and as I was looking for an apartment to stay I found two that are exceptionally good prices compared to others and i would like your help on if they are scam or not... thanks in advance

1. https://www.booking.com/Share-weVoYcr

2. https://www.booking.com/Share-s1z8Jf

I had 4 hotels booked across Prague, Salzburg, and Budapest for a trip happening in two weeks, plus 4 hotels across Hokkaido and Tokyo for a ski trip at the end of January 2027. I logged into Booking.com to review my upcoming plans just to do my own due diligence as the Europe trip is happening soon and saw that 3 of my 4 Europe hotels were cancelled and all of my Japan hotels were cancelled. I received no notification. If I had not checked, I would have been absolutely screwed for Europe. I'll also say that last I checked about a week ago, everything seemed confirmed and fine.

As for the Japan ski trip, this one is likely already totally screwed. I planned ahead and secured decent ski in ski out accommodations and hotels near the resorts because logistics matter in Hokkaido during winter and the volume of snow makes getting around difficult. Also, if you don't book MONTHS in advance (no joke like hotels are already booked out now, no exaggeration) you won't get accomodation or you'll be confined to shared bathroom ski bum type situations or places further out or more expensive. I checked the same hotels I had reservations for and now and they are either sold out or priced 1.5x to 2x higher than when I booked last month.

Booking.com's customer support is terrible and seems designed to outlast you and make you take the L rather than actually help. I have been on hold for over an hour. The chatbot inexplicably does not allow you to send messages to their support team or start new chats to actually reach a human and resolve the issue.

They cancelled 7 of my 9 bookings without informing me and I have no idea why. I have used Booking multiple times over the past 10 years with over 20 successful bookings across Korea, Japan, Singapore, Indonesia, and the US. I have never no showed, always paid, never had a payment decline, and never had a bad review or stay. My booking history in my account on the website is also now gone, which is also inexplicable.

I will also say that I have constantly battled Booking's software during checkout. Dates change from one screen to another. The site says payment details are missing when everything is correct. I clear cookies, log out, log back in, try incognito, Chrome, Firefox, and usually get through on the third or fourth try. Sometimes the checkout page says the booking failed, then I get an email five minutes later saying it succeeded. That would be the only weird thing that could have flagged my account, but again, none of that is my fault and is solely the fault of their website. Those issues did not even happen with my most recent bookings.

Now I am screwed for both trips and need to find suboptimal lodging at higher prices, further from the resorts, or that is simply unavailable. This is through no fault of my own. My Japan trip is totally fucked. I am not exaggerating when I say Niseko and other Hokkaido ski resorts book out around now for January and February 2027. DYOR and see for yourself.

I am not sure what the purpose of this post is beyond detailing my frustration and helping others who search for Booking.com cancelled reservations. Maybe spark discussion or find solutions if they exist, though from what I am seeing, none do. I am screwed for Japan regardless. Word to the wise: book directly from hotel websites if you need certainty and cannot afford to have your trips randomly cancelled.

EDIT: Providing an update here in case it's helpful for anyone landing here from search

1. Booking let me know that they cancelled my reservations because my account was incorrectly flagged in their system.
2. Their response was useless and amounted to "sometimes it happens, but we reactivated your account, and no we can't reinstate your reservations". No reasons given as to why, no further explanations, no answer as to price matching my old reservations, no update on refunds, actually not even an apology lmao.
3. Lesson here is to make sure you book directly with the hotels to avoid any potential issues especially if the hotels are in high demand and the location of the hotels is important.
4. It's unfortunate that the booking.com subreddit resident troll decided to make this post his home for the day but please ignore him and try to find the tidbits of discussion that provide help or insight if you're running into a similar situation. Don't listen to him and other trolls because YES, booking will in fact cancel your reservations if your account somehow gets flagged in their system. YES your account can get flagged even if the age of the account is over 10 years old and has over 50 previous reservations. NO they won't do anything about it and their customer service sucks.
5. DM'ing their reddit account might "help" in that they'll reinstate your account and tell you they fucked up without offering an apology or any real resolution. YES I may still have to dispute these charges with my credit card company because it doesn't look like they're going to refund me.