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Fraudulent Hotel websites surfaced by Wego searches
Fraudulent hotel websites surfaced by Wego searches
http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-...
"cheaphotelsresorts.com and bookinhotels.com
Please be advised that both websites are the same fraudulent travel websites.
Based on other's comments and own experience these websites are fraudulent ie.
1. The customer service phone numbers do not work
2. The companies have domain names registered in Holland and Turkey and credit card payments are processed in Istanbul
3. Others that have booked with them report that when they arrive at destination the hotel is unable to confirm a reservation was made even though the websites have charged their credit cards
4. Others report that the companies will debit your credit card multiple times
5. Although the website states you can cancel reservation it is unlikely you will ever get reimbursed.
CONCLUSION. FRAUDULENT TRAVEL WEBSITE. BEWARE!
NB. At present it appears that authorities do no care about protecting consumers given there is currently no listing of known fraudulent websites like there is for viruses,worms,email scams etc.
Caveat emptor Buyer Beware is the best there is currently.
PS. It is important that those who experience fraud report it to the following agencies to reduce the ever increasing amount of cyber crime. www.ic3.gov and www.phonebusters.com in the hope that one day they will post a consumer website listing known frauduluent websites to help protect the unsuspecting public."
I recently looked for the best hotel rates for Lanson Place in Kuala Lumpur, and wego surfaced bookinhotels.com with the best rates. Just to be sure, I checked to see if there is any fraud in for the hotel website, and above are what I found.
Beware, and take precautions!
http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-...
"cheaphotelsresorts.com and bookinhotels.com
Please be advised that both websites are the same fraudulent travel websites.
Based on other's comments and own experience these websites are fraudulent ie.
1. The customer service phone numbers do not work
2. The companies have domain names registered in Holland and Turkey and credit card payments are processed in Istanbul
3. Others that have booked with them report that when they arrive at destination the hotel is unable to confirm a reservation was made even though the websites have charged their credit cards
4. Others report that the companies will debit your credit card multiple times
5. Although the website states you can cancel reservation it is unlikely you will ever get reimbursed.
CONCLUSION. FRAUDULENT TRAVEL WEBSITE. BEWARE!
NB. At present it appears that authorities do no care about protecting consumers given there is currently no listing of known fraudulent websites like there is for viruses,worms,email scams etc.
Caveat emptor Buyer Beware is the best there is currently.
PS. It is important that those who experience fraud report it to the following agencies to reduce the ever increasing amount of cyber crime. www.ic3.gov and www.phonebusters.com in the hope that one day they will post a consumer website listing known frauduluent websites to help protect the unsuspecting public."
I recently looked for the best hotel rates for Lanson Place in Kuala Lumpur, and wego surfaced bookinhotels.com with the best rates. Just to be sure, I checked to see if there is any fraud in for the hotel website, and above are what I found.
Beware, and take precautions!
I’m frustrated
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The more people who ask this question, the more it gets noticed.
The best answer from the company
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Hi all - please be advised that Wego no longer searches BookInHotels.com since February when they were taken down from the site. Thank you for using Wego.
The company says
this answers the question
Create a customer community for your own organization
Plans starting at $19/month
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Inappropriate?Dear Sir,
We are sorry for your inconvenience.
According to your questions please find below replies.
Bookinhotels.com has been operating since 2003 which offers the best possible room rates in all major cities of the world with more than 60.000 hotels luxury, airport, boutique, budget, etc, in the fastest possible time by attracting over 30 millions visitors in 180 countries and employs 400 people worlwide.
Our goal is to achieve to build a comprehensive database of hotels around ın the world at very reasonable and discounted rates and best custumer services .
Your comfort is our mission. We also guarantee to fınd the best hotels on the date and the location our custumer want , quickly easily and safetely with the best prices . We are dedicetad to facilitate your excursion .
If you need any assistance about your booking or would like to ask further questions you can contact our customer service directly 7/24
Sincerely,
Customer Services
www.BookinHotels.com
Q&A
1. The customer service phone numbers do not work
Our customer service works 24 hours a day - 7 days a week. You may contact below phone numbers directly
UK Number (local London time)
Phone : 00 44 207 100 5621
Fax : 00 44 207 681 3898
Call US Number (local New York time)
Phone : 001 212 202 6710
Fax : 001 646 417 7112
2. The companies have domain names registered in Holland and Turkey and credit card payments are processed in Istanbul
Our head account office based in Turkey therefore all payments are being processed in Istanbul. However we have no relations in Holland
3. Others that have booked with them report that when they arrive at destination the hotel is unable to confirm a reservation was made even though the websites have charged their credit cards
At the time of your booking request, the full quoted amount will be blocked / authorised on your credit card. Only when the booking is confirmed will the credit card be charged (for Instant Availability bookings this is at the time of the booking request). Payment transactions on the book in hotels website are encrypted by a secure payment system endorsed by some of the world's leading banks and our site is verified by SSL
This technically secure environment ensures that credit card details cannot be intercepted and are not revealed to anyone other than to financial institutions required to process payment instructions from the customer.
Our payment system currently accepts Mastercard and Visa
Please inform us with your reservation number then we will investigate for you
4. Others report that the companies will debit your credit card multiple times
This is not correct. Only when the booking is confirmed will the credit card be charged (for Instant Availability bookings this is at the time of the booking request). Please inform us with your reservation number then we will investigate for you
5. Although the website states you can cancel reservation it is unlikely you will ever get reimbursed.
A cancellation may result in refunds to you which will be made in the form of a credit to your credit card account.
All credit card refunds will be processed in a timely manner (typically this takes several weeks for the instruction to leave our bank).
The refunds process is dependent on your billing cycle with your credit card company.
Once the refund instructions leave our bank it can take up to one month for the proceeds to arrive in your account.
1 Comment Add a comment
This answers the question
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This company is a scam, I book my hotel with them on last year nov for 3 rooms and end up the cancelled my booking the night before i check in and told me they will do a full refund. I waited and waited but no refund.
Below are all their replies :
Dear Yvonne Low,We regret to inform you that due to the financial issues between our supplier and us we cannot honor your booking therefore full refund is going to be made to your credit card provided.
We sincerely apologize for the late notification and kindly advise you that you may contact the hotel directly and try to confirm your booking with them if possible.
For any questions or concerns, you may contact our customer representatives via e mail or via our contact phones at any time. This is a very regrettable incident and we are very sorry indeed.
Thank you for your kind understanding.
Kind Regards
Customer Service
Bookinhotels.com
Dear Yvonne Low,
Full refund cannot be made in this case since there is a cancellation charges.Your refund of 139.34 usd has been made back to your credit card provided therefore you are able to see this amount in your account within the 3-4 working days.
Kind Regards,
Dilek YENI
Dear Yvonne Low,
Please note that refunds are made in the form of a credit to your card account. All credit card refunds are processed in a timely manner. Typically, this process takes several weeks (business days) for the instruction to leave our company account. The refunds process depends on your billing cycle with the cooperated credit card company. Once the refunded amount leaves our company account, it may take up to two months time for the proceeds to appear back in your account.
Best Regards
Customer Service
Bookinhotels.com
Dear yvonne low;
We would like to inform you that we have made this booking through one of our agency and we are waiting for a credit note from the hotel and agency as soon as we receive it we will make your refund and inform you by an e-mail .Thank you
Dear Ms Yvonne Low;
Please ignore our previous e-mail.. As this is our company mistake, you will receive your Full Refund back to your account .
CONTACT LINK : http://www.bookinhotels.com/?action=c...
Please do not reply this email. Use the form linked above to contact.
We wish you a pleasant trip and having pleasure to serving on your travels in the future.
Best Regards,
Customer Service
BookinHotels.com
Those are the email that i have receive telling me that i will expect a full refund because of their mistake but i waited from mar until now and no refund was given.
This website is a scam to cheat on customer and they will collect deduct your credit card but never honour any booking and refused to refund.
never ever book on this website. Beware of them
They set up this website is to cheat all customer money and u can never find them, never answer my calls and now did not even bother to reply my several emails sent. -
Inappropriate?UK Number (local London time)
Phone : 00 44 207 100 5621
Call US Number (local New York time)
Phone : 001 212 202 6710
Neither worked at 11.27 am on Friday 12/12/08 local London time and any time earlier today. I was met with an answering machine telling me that this phone was not connected to the internet.
-M -
Inappropriate?I made a reservation to BookinHotels to be used in February. I cancelled my trip in January 9th. I have sent lots of emails asking to be refunded and they never did. They even didn't answer my last complain.
Roberta
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Inappropriate?Yes, they are fraudsters. 4 months of lies and endless platitudes from them. They won't reply when you let them know that "you know".
EVERYONE - HIT THEM WITH ENDLESSS EMAILS TO ALL OF THEIR DOMAINS TELLING THEM TO "HONOUR THEIR REFUND POLICY"
Here is the culprits email...alper@bookinhotels.com
Registrar: DOTSTER
Domain Name: BOOKINHOTELS.COM
Created on: 01-OCT-03
Expires on: 01-OCT-11
Last Updated on: 03-OCT-08
Administrative, Technical Contact:
Ozar, Alper alper@bookinhotels.com
Ozar Turizm Ltd Sti.
Prof Kazim Ismail Gurkan Cad No 2/2 Hamam Sok
Kardesler Han Cagaloglu Istanbul
Istanbul, Cagaloglu 341102 Comments Add a comment
This answers the question
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This comment was removed on 11/21/09.
see the change log -
Hi Greg,
Could you please tell me how did you reach this e-mail address and company
address? I'm trying to contact this company and could not success to do so via the e-mail address you provided above. Also, the other ones (serkan.canim... and NO-REPLAY) do not work either... -
Inappropriate?I booked a room (16.05.2009) in Florence, at Grand Baglioni Hotel, through bookinhotels.com. I recived instant confirmation and the voucher for the room. The money have been instant withdrawn from my credit card. After two days (18.05.2009) I recived two mails. The first one was from serkan.canim@bookinhotels.com, who says that they are not able to confirm my booking for Grand Baglioni Hotel as the agreement beween their supplier and the hotel has ended.
The second mail, from NO-REPLAY@bookinhotels.com, announced me the cancellation of my reservation and say: "Please note that refunds are made in the form of a credit to your card account. (...) Once the refunded amount leaves our company account, it may take up to two months time for the proceeds to appear back in your account."
So I wrote to Mr Serkan Canim asking him to explain to me how it is possible to take two months to get my money back, but I never received an answer.
Later, I saw on the internet that a lot of people were deceived in the same way. Many of them have never received any money back.
I think that all those who have been deceived should file complaints against Bookinhotels.com to no longer be deceived other peoples and Bookinhotels.com no longer obtain money by deception and fraud.
Complaints can be made to https://econsumer.ftccomplaintassista...
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?Bookinhotels has scammed me too.
Having spoken to my card company and Trading Standards it looks as though im powerless to do anything about getting my money back as bookinhotels have been clever about the way they have set themselves up leaving me without the necessary info to make claims like even an address for example. As they are possibly based in another country that also renders me powerless!
I have decided to write to Watchdog in hope that they can do something about this and make it more public!
I have added a link below to the Watchdog site for people to email their bookinhotels story and hope that if enough people write in then Watchdog will take a look in to this case and do what they can.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotasto...
There is also a facebook group warning people, please join via the below link. Tell your friends, tell everybody!
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=.../group.php?gid=105603931844
I’m furious!
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Inappropriate?Hi
did you ever get a reply - I have been waiting for a refund for over 2 months now!!
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?I have but its a rare case and probably only because I harassed them and made life difficult for them by publicising their bad rep on many travel sites and i created a facebook group that lies alongside theirs in a search.
See here for more info:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=105603931844
I’m pleased.
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Inappropriate?I just got swindled by Book In Hotels. Thought I got a bargain at NH hotels in Nice. Ordered, paid for and received a prepaid voucher. When arriving at the hotel I was told that the order was canceled by Kuoni Travel the room broker used by Book In Hotels. The reason Book In Hotel didn't send my payment. According to both NH hotels and Kuoni, the problem is mine. I had to put up my credit card again, this time for twice the original amount. The crooks are, of course, Book In Hotels, but both NH hotels and Kuoni share responsibility!! I will be filing fraud claims with Visa and hope to get the first payment back. My vacation was ruined. By the way I blame Google too. My search for the hotel hit very very high, meaning Google most likely got paid for promoting Book In Hotels site
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Inappropriate?I was so worry after reading comments about bookinhotels.com as I had already booked and paid for a twins room in Osaka Japan. A week before my departure, I received an email asking for more money if I wanted the twins room, they said that the money I paid, was just for a standard semi double room. I didn't want to cancel it (afraid that I would never get my money back), also didn't want to pay more so I had to accept the semi double room and tried to change at the hotel. I called the hotel 3 days before check in to make sure they had my booking (I had never have to call for other bookings before). Checked in and had a semi double room. The hotel was nice. What a relief.
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Inappropriate?I had the same bad experience as most of you guys.. unfortunately I'm not an American Citizen, but everyone who is - why don't you file a complaint at the FBI internet crime complaint center: http://www.ic3.gov/default.aspx ? Maybe that will get some things moving! Best of luck to all of us with horrible experiences and lets hope these guys get their fair share of justice one day...
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Inappropriate?I have had the same problem with Book In Hotels. I asked for a refund 11 weeks ago. Despite numerous email requests I still don't have my refund. The are holding US$200+ of my money and it is really frustrating. I have never had this problem with an online hotel booking engine before. This company should be shut down.
I’m Frustrated
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Inappropriate?The same happened to me! They were the cheepest, took the money instantly, and 5 days before my departure they annonced my reservasion is cancelled, and that I'll get my money back in a few months... Now I see it would be dificult to get anything back... Thank you all for your awareness. At least now I know whom I'm dealing with.
I’m Angry
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Inappropriate?In July 2009 I booked seeing an interesting stay in Firenze for two nights with breakfast buffet on the website of bookinhotels. The publicity on the site shows logo of Visa and Mastercard ('controlled by').The voucher with logo of transHotel (worldwide known) announced our confirmation of reservation, also 'paid and booked by transHotel' and guarantee by transHotel. So very thrustfull. When we arrived at our hotel Villa Liberty after 1400 km driving the receptionist told us that there was no booking for us. Astonished as we were, we had to go for another hotel and pay. I send a complaint to the customer service of bookinhotels. The morning after I had an answer saying they were verry sorry for the inconveniences and would make refundment for the supplement. We were informed that transHotel had cancelled our reservation the day before our arrival in Firenze ! We didn't book with them ! Back in Belgium I searched in google 'fraud by...' and found lots of complaints. So I contacted the press (Het Nieuwsblad and De Standaard). They put an article in their newspaper. I also send an e-mail to www.ecops.be and the Federal Department of Economy, Internet Fraud. I contacted the responsible of transHotel to keep me informed why they cancelled our reservations. I mailed it to all the responsibles of transHotel. I only got an answer by mail of their customer service that the also were sorry for inconvenience but that they cancelled all the reservations of clients of bookinhotels due to the amount of debt bookinhotels has to transHotel. So I have prove that they have a B/B relationship and transHotel doesn't even take precautions during several years that they trade with fraudulent people. I'm intended to warn the Turkish (bookinhotels) and Spanish (transHotel) authorities that these people should make refundment for all consumers !!!
sincerelly yours
Hugo Vanbellingen (Belgium)
I’m furious
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Inappropriate?I've had the same experience with these thieving scum bags. I'm waiting for a refund after they cancelled my booking....3 months later and no sign of my money. They should be shut down immediately.
I’m so annoyed!
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Inappropriate?Hi guys, i asked a legal guy i know and he told me to e-mail the turkish ministry of tourism at Info@kultur.gv.tr. that it might help??????? , i have booked with these shower also 246 euro i await. Bunch of crooks, rang for completely one day and they picked phone up and hung it up straight away........ fucking wankers
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Inappropriate?I just got my money refunded by VISA. I urge everyone to do the same. The more people who ask for the transaction to be reversed by VISA, the more likely it is that VISA will shut them down.
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Inappropriate?Hi all - please be advised that Wego no longer searches BookInHotels.com since February when they were taken down from the site. Thank you for using Wego.
The company says
this answers the question
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Inappropriate?Bookinhotels.com is indeed a scam company!
I booked three hotels at their website. They cancelled 2 of the hotels on the day of our arrival so I had to find another room as I arrived. The third hotel I cancelled myself because they would cancel it also. I never got the money back!!!
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Inappropriate?i have also the same situation as you. untli now i did not receive refund 329 euro its almost 2 months ago . the bank wil not honour my request because they have only 30 days allowance to reverse transaction. its too late for me. The website BOOKINHOTELS.com blocked my mail becaused i made complaint wat they are doing me and other people. im really sorry to read bad experiences, too much complaints about them they are still going on every day 's stealing money of travelers. Why this site cannot be shutdouwn sothat no more victims.
DONT BOOK WITH THIS SITE YOU WOULD NOT BE HAPPY
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?I made a booking with Book-in-Hotels but bad to cancel (because I found out that the hotel was horrible). It's been nearly seven months (I did the booking in April 09) and no refund, even though I've emailed them several times and they keep saying they will refund my money. I paid $2198 (Australian $). Why can't the relevant authorities remove them from the website, find out who they are, and put them in jail as well as fine them heavily!
