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Bien A.

Contributor Level

Total Points
85

1 Review by Bien

  • Booking.com

11/16/15

Last Oct. 30,2015, my party which includes 4 adults and 2 kids (ages 10,3), checked into our rented Vacayo apartment at about 5pm EST. Aftr resting a while, we left the aparment at 730pm to eat dinner. We came back to the apartment almost 3 hours later, and found that we could no longer access our apartment. To clarify we could get into the building, but not into the apartment.

(Electronic lock shown near finger)

Aftr numerous tries, we tried calling vacayo apartments but could only reach their voicemail, we tried contacting the person they assigned to help us with our check in, and we we were unable to reach him right away as well. We then decided to call booking.com, although the agent was very helpful, was unable to reach anyone from vacayo as well. We decided to stay patient, hoping someone from vacayo would eventually call us back to help us. We tried calling all the numbers Vacayo gave us and again were unable to reach anyone. At 11:39pm, Kareem, the Vacayo representative in-charge of our checkin, finally texted and called me. But he too was unable to help us over the phone, and said that he would see what else he could do, and that he would text or call us back. 30 mins later, with no feedback from Kareem, we texted him again asking for his help, but he did not reply. So I decided to call booking.com for the 2nd or 3rd time already that evening, to asked for help again. At this point we were all exhausted coming off a 19 hour flight, and were also cold in the hallway with all our things inside the apartment, except for what we had on us. We all just wanted to sleep, especially the children but could not.

( pictures above show were my brother sat, with his 10 year old son sleeping on the floor beside him)

(This hallway is were my sister in law sat with my 3 yr old niece, who was crying most of the time. The stairwell going up is where my sister and I sat, alternating calls to vacayo and booking.com). At 1:30am on Oct. 31,2015, after not hearing back from Kareem and vacayo, and the booking.com agent saying that he could not help us with last minute bookings since it was already past midnight, we decided to look for another place for the night or in this case early morning. The cheapest place we could find in Manhattan at that time of morning, that had an available room was Gardens NYC, but it would cost us $580.11. We decided to take it, rather that the alternative of sleeping in the hallway. We also spend $26.53 on Uber taxi to get to the hotel since it was located in the upper east side, and our apartment is in the lower east side. All in all we were able to check in by 3am.

That morning, Kareem from Vacayo called at about 930am saying he was in the city and would be able to help us "in a while". By 11am on Oct. 31, he finally called to say he was on the way to the apartment, and I told him that I would meet up with him there. We got to the apartment just past 12pm, fortunately Kareem was already able to open the apartment door by then. He informed us that something went wrong with the doorknob, that is why we could not get in. He said he would report to his office that the incident was not our fault, something which we knew all along. After he left, I called booking.com to informed your company that we got into our apartment already and to help us with a reinbursement of atleast $580, for this unnecessary expense.

Throughout the entire nightmare, We not once lost our tempers, despite our feeling of helplessness during that time. No one from vacayo or booking.com was able to help us, not until over 12 hrs since we first requested help.

As of right now, Nov. 3,2015 that feeling of helplessness is back. We feel booking.com and especially vacayo apartments are not taking our claim seriously. No one has apologized to us, except for some empty words, but more importantly our refund request has been totally disregarded up to this point. You would think that someone from booking.com would act on this instantly, but you would be wrong. I feel you did not value our business, and are hoping we would just go away quitely. We are not!

I regret using booking.com, and will not use it in the future. And I will make sure that as many people that I can reach will be informed of this incident and the lack of action from your company. Sending emails is insufficient, and not helpful at all. We want results, and nothing over what should rightfully be refunded to us.

Bien Has Earned 5 Votes

Bien A.'s review of Booking.com earned a Fraud Buster vote

Bien A.'s review of Booking.com earned 4 Very Helpful votes

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