How to cancel a paid booking on booking.com. Rules for booking hotels and hotels. How to cancel a booking on Booking

During the year, this review gained more than 11,000 views and every day I receive at least 1-2 emails asking for help. How I avoided paying a cancellation fee on booking.com. What happens if you don't pay the fine? Is it possible to just not respond to emails? How to avoid payment when canceling a booking? About all this concisely and to the point I will tell in this review If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer in the comments. I hope that my review will help you avoid paying with my method!

Almost always when independent travel I book through booking.com. Most recently, I got into an unpleasant situation - I booked a hotel in Madagascar and did not calculate the dates. I wanted to cancel the reservation, but it was written that a fine of 16,000 was charged for cancellation, that is, half the cost of the hotel. If the booking is canceled one week in advance, the penalty will increase to the full price. Of course, I was very upset by this state of affairs and I began to think about how to avoid paying a penalty on booking when canceling a booking. And found!!! Didn't pay a dime, but first things first.

First of all, I began to look on the forums for ways to avoid paying a fine. The man wrote there about a similar situation, but he simply decided not to respond to messages from booking.com. Soon he began to receive letters from the bank that owns the card. Where the amount was twice the amount that he did not pay. Instead of 35,000 - 70. As a result, he was nevertheless forced to pay through the court, so I put aside this option of “just getting lost”.

Next, I started looking necessary information on the booking site itself. And found. It said that if you want to cancel your booking and avoid a penalty, you must contact the hotel directly, as the cancellation policy is set jointly by both booking and the hotel and neither party can cancel the penalty on its own.

So I did! I wrote an official letter to the hotel’s e-mail, said that I mixed up the dates and couldn’t check in these days, explained the reason why I couldn’t pay (wrote that I didn’t have money), but mentioned that I really like this hotel and I would really like to come to them in the future .... So to say, "so as not to spoil the relationship," the letter was written in English. The answer came, but only after 2-3 days. They apparently did not understand or pretended that they did not understand me and said that I could change the reservation on my own (that is, for this fee of 16 thousand, which did not suit me very much). I wrote a more detailed letter stating that I was not going to call in, I also had nothing to pay with. That is, they can start to beat money out of me, but this process is lengthy, and no one wants problems. And if they write to booking to cancel my reservation for free, then I will cancel it on the same day and someone else can call on them in my room, no one will lose money.

To be honest, I did not really believe that they would agree))) but I tried to write as friendly as possible. And, oh miracle! The next day I received a message that they wrote to the booking system to change the booking conditions for me and agree to my conditions!)) wished me all the best and wrote that they would be waiting for me at their hotel! After that, a special letter from booking came with the note "changes in your booking conditions", where there was a magical "free" when canceling a booking or no show. I calmly pressed this button and thanked the universe for my luck! )

My joy knew no bounds! I managed to avoid the booking fine. Through short but polite negotiations. You will get it too! Good luck!!!

On this issue, they write to me often, so a big request, if you tried to do the same, write in the comments whether you managed to cancel the reservation or not. Or if there is some similar successful experience, I think there will be people who will be grateful to you for it!

Every day I receive letters asking me to help cancel the reservation, forward the text or help compose it. I love helping people and I remember myself walking dead and alive in anticipation of the fact that I would have to pay such a large amount due to a mistake. That's why I never refused to help. But before you write to me, I want to ask you first of all not to worry! Most letters have headings like "save help", calm down and do not think about the bad, because 95% of cases, as my experience shows, are decided in your favor and you are not alone. Especially you should not worry if your reservation is made without indicating the card, just by phone or mail. Just yesterday I canceled such a paid reservation last time, to be honest, the hotel was upset, but they simply have nowhere to charge me a fine. And the main rule - always notify if you are not going to call in as soon as you are convinced of this, since not only you can lose money, but also people for whom this is income and someone else can call in your places, even if the dates are close. I go to the accounts of those who wrote to me, and I understand that the page was created only to ask my question. That's why

I booked a hotel on Booking.com, but did not notice that the room was somehow discounted and it turned out that the reservation could not be canceled, and I decided to cancel it an hour after, as it suddenly turned out that he would be given a vacation only next week.
What to do in this case?
IN this moment there is not enough money on the card to pay for the hotel. But they are there. Will the hotel withdraw/block part of the amount?
Will it be possible to cancel all the reserves on the card by coming to the bank?
If I change the card (it is 2 months before the replacement, I wanted to renew it before the trip anyway), will the card number change and the hotel will not be able to withdraw money from the account on a certain day?
Is there a cultural method for canceling a booking?

Quote:

Useless. If the booking conditions are non-refundable, the hotel can withdraw money. If there is no money on the card, then the so-called debit balance on the account will appear, you will owe the bank. And they will charge you a fine for it.

Another question is that if the reservation is canceled within an hour, maybe. the hotel will not take money from the card. Write to them that you accidentally booked the wrong dates, canceled almost instantly, ask them not to withdraw money.

Quote: Disagree. I do not see the prerequisites for the non-acceptance spmsania that you write about. This is possible if the conditions of the reservation have been violated. For example, the room is booked, the reservation is not canceled, and the client did not check in. In this case, the hotel has the right to write off the cost of the fine even from blank card. But the author did not violate the booking conditions, he simply does not have enough money on the card to make this booking in accordance with the conditions. In this case, a letter from the booking should come with a request to replenish the account or provide other card details. If no action is taken after 24 hours, the booking will be cancelled.
Judging by the question of the author - a debit card. The credit card will be written off at the expense of the credit limit.

Quote: I agree. If we are not talking about a PREPAID rate (that is, payment at the time of booking), but only about non-refundable, then if there is a lack of funds or even better, blocking the card, booking will most likely warn about the impossibility of saving the reservation.T. e. the easiest option is to block the card altogether. Issue another one. Other options are impossible, already checked. Hotels do not make any concessions in this option (like I made a mistake, I want to cancel). There is already experience.

Quote: Yes, it happens in different ways. Here, on the Review, I saw how a person booked at a rate with a non-refundable cost, after 2 hours he realized that he was mistaken and wrote a letter to booking. The answer waited 3 days, as a result, the hotel went forward and canceled the reservation. But this is probably not a typical case.

Quote: a couple of months ago I accidentally booked a hotel with a non-refundable reservation, I realized a mistake after a call from the operator from the bank, they say, they are trying to withdraw money from the card. The next day I wrote an error to the hotel, cancel the reservation, they answer, they say, we have nothing to do with it, write to booking. I wrote to booking and attached an answer from the hotel, after a couple of hours the booking answered, they say, as an exception, we cancel the reservation.

today's market online services Booking is replete with offers of all kinds of services with which you can find cheap accommodation anywhere in the world. One of these resources is Booking. Working in real time with more than 200,000 hotels, the system instantly issues the most favorable prices and suggestions. Booking.com is the most popular online platform for searching, pre-booking hotels around the world. Indispensable for solo travelers, lovers of adventure and economy.

So, you have used the services of the service, booked a room and continue to plan your vacation or business trip. There is always the possibility of force majeure and a forced change of plans. For this purpose, the service provides the service of canceling a pre-order. Is there free cancellation on booking? How effective it is, how to use it, you will learn right here.

How to cancel a booking on booking.com?

Unfortunately, not everything always goes as planned, sometimes circumstances arise that require the abandonment of planned trips. But what if the hotel is already booked? We go to the site and "turn back time".

Cancellation conditions, subtleties of the procedure

The most important thing to remember for a tourist who is faced with a cancellation is that you can always cancel the "order" without financial loss. The conditions for such cancellation different hotels are different. It is advisable, even at the stage of choosing a hotel, to familiarize yourself with the cancellation conditions that the hotel administration puts forward.

Often, you can cancel a placed order without penalty if you do it a certain number of days before the date of the expected arrival. Each hotel dictates its own rules, the number of days can vary from one to thirty days. Some hotels, even with a cancellation notice, charge the daily rate, but this is easily avoided. Please read the terms and conditions of each individual hotel complex so as not to face fines. When booking a hotel for specific dates, the free cancellation period can be clearly defined.

Step by step cancellation

As soon as you have made and confirmed your booking, you will receive a notification that a confirmation email has been sent to your postal address. Under it, a link is displayed, by clicking on which you can cancel or change the reservation.

If you are a registered user, you can easily carry out all actions in personal account.

If you didn't check in when you booked, the cancellation process looks a little different for you. When you place an order, you will receive a confirmation email at the email address you provided earlier. It has two links that will allow you to change or cancel your booking. Whichever of the two links you click on, they will lead to the final cancellation of the booked room. By clicking on the red “cancel” button, a dialog box will appear on the screen where you can specify the reason. After canceling, a confirmation message will pop up in front of you.

The return rate allows you to avoid penalties. It is important to perform all actions in advance, clearly following the conditions of the hotel. Given that Booking.com does not require advance payment residence, you will not need to pay a penalty if all deadlines are met.

Today I will talk about how Booking.com makes life easier independent traveler even in such an unpleasant matter as canceling a reservation. I share only my experience.

My experience with the Booking.com booking system has long exceeded ten years, and we can say that the system is evolving, with most of the changes in better side. Let's look at all the options in which you may need to cancel your reservation:

• you have found the best option residence
• your plans have changed
• you booked for a visa ()
• illness (or other unfortunate circumstances) intervened.

These are the four most common cases in which you may need to cancel your reservation. Booking.com offers different booking options:

• with free cancellation (and in this case, you can cancel your booking easily and without thinking about the consequences);
• non-refundable booking (this booking cannot be canceled without losing its full price);
• and the middle option is a booking that can be canceled by paying a fine (assigned in each case individually).

At the same time, even for a reservation with free cancellation, a timeout is set - the time after which cancellation can only be made with a fine. This time is also set individually, a penalty may be charged if canceled a day before arrival or two weeks in advance, there are an infinite number of options. Therefore, when booking, be sure to pay attention to these conditions. The most recent example: I drove along the Golden Ring, and last night I had in Moscow, respectively, with a booking booking. But we, as jet tourists, looked around Sergiev Posad half a day faster and arrived in Moscow at two o'clock in the afternoon, it became possible to leave home a day earlier. And we canceled the Moscow booking, in terms of cancellation of which was until 18.00 on the day of check-in!!! They also quickly handed over train tickets, bought new ones and ended up at home a day earlier, without financial losses. So the booking conditions can make your trip as comfortable as possible in terms of changing plans.

But sometimes, of course, not everything is so smooth, shit happens, I was able to personally verify this, breaking my arm the day before departure. Now I have invaluable experience, and, of course, air travel, which I share with you.

To cancel a booking on the Booking.com website, go to the "my bookings" section and click on the blue "view booking" button:

Here we see different possibilities to cancel. If your cancellation is free, then you simply choose the reason for the cancellation (found the best option, no longer going on a trip, etc.) and click on the blue button “cancel the booking completely”.

After that, you will receive an email confirming that your booking has been canceled, and you will also see this in your personal account. If the cancellation of the reservation involves the collection of a fine, then you can try to negotiate with the hotel administration, for this there is a yellow button, we click on it and get to the following page:

Here we fill out a form, that is, we indicate the reason why we refuse the tempting prospect of coming to this beautiful hotel, which must be strong enough for the hotel to refuse a bloodthirsty attempt to write off a fine from us. I just wrote that I broke my arm. Click on the blue "Request a Fee Reduction" button.

Hotels respond differently. Not out of harm, it depends on the work schedule of managers. Booking gives them 48 hours to consider our request.

This is what our request looks like if we go to the booking now:

And we will receive an automatic letter from the booking in the mail:

Then it remains only to wait for mercy from the hotel. In my experience, most hoteliers go along and cancel without penalty. I was especially shocked by the nobility of the hotel administration, which I was supposed to check in in less than a day - no fines, it's so nice!

But there are exceptions, not everyone is so disinterested and noble:

If you have already paid for the reservation, then the money will be returned to you upon cancellation:

There is only one thing to remember: after 48 hours, the request time will expire and the booking will be updated again, so be sure to keep an eye on the timeout. If your request came over the weekend, there is a high chance that it will simply not be seen. This means absolutely nothing, just repeat your request again until you wait for the administration's response. Writing to the booking support service on this issue is a waste of time.

After such experiences (and I had reservations for 15 days in different cities) I became an even bigger fan of booking: out of eight bookings, only one was canceled with a fine and one was offered to be rescheduled to other dates, all the rest were canceled without loss!

If you book a hotel instead of an already booked

It happens that you find a hotel that meets your expectations better than the one that has already been booked. In this case, you make a new booking, and at the stage of its confirmation, the system itself will remind you that you already have a booking for this date and offer to cancel it. Check the boxes, but then still do not forget to check that the booking was really canceled:

I’ll tell you about what to do if there are problems with the booking due to the fault of the owner, how to solve problems as comfortably as possible, in a separate post: .

I wish you pleasant travels and as little as possible of such unpleasant troubles!