HostelworldReviews 134

My first experience with Hostelworld was extremely disappointing. After booking a hostel, my reservation was canceled due to a system error on their platform. Despite reaching out to their support team, I was told to resolve the issue directly with the hostel which was neither helpful nor feasible resulting in wasted time and unnecessary stress.
To make matters worse, after all of this, the hostel unexpectedly deducted €60 from my account and informed me via email that only one night was booked, even though I had clearly intended to book two nights via hostelworld. This disorganized and misleading experience cost me both time and money, and showed a complete lack of coordination and responsibility from Hostelworld. I would not recommend their services to anyone

It is what you can count on when you look for where to stay when traveling. It is friendly and effective to use, and reasonable price!

Do not book through this scam company. They allow you to book and pay for accommodation, then email you before arrival to cancel and send a refund minus their fee, keeping some of your deposit. Just rip off merchants. I'm left out of pocket.

Super easy to use, fast way to plan trips and accomodations, friendly and efficient customer service!

I booked a hostel that said "free cancellation up to 5 days in advance" in the header field or in the confirmation section of the reservation.
I then cancelled within the free cancellation period and was charged a non-refundable deposit.
At the end of the "PROPERTY DESCRIPTION" section, there was an additional booking condition (a non-refundable €20 deposit is required for reservations over €120) in small print.
Usually, the booking terms are clearly and prominently stated in the header or on the confirmation page of the reservation.
Not once did any other booking site say "free cancellation" in the header and then put an additional booking condition in the "facility description" section.
I protested and asked for a refund from the hostel and Hostelworld, but when I finally received a response, the hostel replied, "It's written in the description section, so we can't give you a refund".
Terrible customer service with incomprehensible site description, I will never use this site again.

Even stranger, when I mentioned this to Trustpilot, they removed my review within 24 hours, saying there was "no evidence".
They are slow to reply to customer service, yet monitors the review site and deletes unsavory reviews immediately!

I booked a stay in Venice through Hostelworld, but due to a mistake on my part, the dates were entered incorrectly. When attempting to correct this error, Hostelworld's customer service proved to be ineffective and neglectful, resulting in an extremely frustrating experience. Despite multiple attempts to contact Hostelworld for assistance, I received no response from their team. This lack of communication and disregard for my situation has compounded the frustration and inconvenience caused by the initial booking error.

I booked a one night stay through hostelworld for a trip to New Orleans. The hostel required payment before staying so I entered my usual credit card that has never had any issues being processed. After getting off my flight in the city that evening I received an email saying my booking had been cancelled as the payment could not be processed and that I should try again with a different card. After a couple of calls with the hostel, they said it was too late for them to make another booking with them for that night so I had to find someplace else to stay. Thankfully there was one other hostel nearby that still had availability for that night so I booked that through hostelworld. After arriving at that hostel they too said that they couldn't process payment on my card, so I paid in cash. I have no idea why that card was declined through hostelworld it has worked everywhere I've been before and after booking through them. But as it turns out when I checked my statement hostelworld were able to process payment through my credit card and were happy to take their booking fee for both reservations I made through the site! Even though both hostels were unable to receive payment from my card via hostelworld. I'm lucky I was able to get into the 2nd hostel or would have paid hostelworld booking fees for the luxury of sleeping on a park bench in the rain. It would have saved me a lot of hassle just to book directly with the original hostel in the first place. Save yourself some stress and $'s and don't ever book through this useless website.

The lady from "HostelWorld' was very helpful in her email reply re, my question re, ID needed to check-in, that is, is a Debit Card sufficient or would a scan of a Passport photo page suffice, in an email I meant. She said to check the individual Hostel and that I could verify things with her if necessary, which was very reassuring as this is very important so that you can Check in without problems.

This review is regarding the hostel policy and refunds for cancellation. My visa was rejected 2 days before my travel date and as a result I had to cancel the hostel booking after the free cancellation period. Since this was unforeseen, I raised the matter of full/partial refund to HostelWorld and Hostel Bedgasm representatives. But both parties denied to even consider a partial refund and hence charged me ¥37,791.00 (USD 255) for 4 nights in Tokyo (For a trip I didn't get to take).

They provide a low quote just to lure you in, then raise prices. Then there are unauthorized charges and you can never get an answer from customer service. Cancellation is 14 days before the reservation, so they wait to answer, just to charge you full price.

I had a problem with a voucher, and customer service had it sorted very quickly with some helpful tips for the future.

We want to write this as a warning to anyone who books here. We booked our stay here through HOSTELWORLD yesterday. We were presented with a price of roughly £200. After paying, we immediately (within 10 minutes) were billed for close to £1100. These were both taken directly from our bank account. It turns out that HOSTEL WORLD collects some sort of commission, and that they only displayed the commission price, and not the actual total. We were charged 2 payments, one from Hostel World, and another from Wombats.

We immediately contacted both Wombat & Hostelworld (within 15 minutes of booking). Wombat has ignored our emails and are not responding whatsoever. Hostel World basically said "Too bad, too sad. Should have read the fine print".

After reading a little bit more, it turns out that Hostel World is known for this scam. They display a price very different when you are booking, but then put the actual price very small and hidden. If you look of "HOSTEL WORLD SCAM" on google, you will find many people discussing this same issue. Please see the attached images I have included.

As for Wombat's, they are complacent in this scam as well. They have access to the same knowledge that we do in regards to Hostel World's less than ethical system, and still are registered with them. Wombat's could simply say that they are not affiliated with them, however my credit card was charged by WOMBATS own internal system within 15 minutes of making this reservation. This means that they are working directly with Hostel World.

Wombats is fully aware of this system, and yet they still continue to affiliate and pay commissions to Hostel World.

The fact that they ignore my emails is also telling of this situation, in that it must not be surprising to them.

Hostel World is a commission collecting 3rd party company that will charge your credit card immediately upon booking for amounts that don't necessarily match their advertising rates.

I guess Wombats could comment here saying it's better to book directly with them, which is probably the case, but this does not address the fact that they continue to work with a company that is specifically deceptive in it's core business model.

Again, please google search "Hostel World Scam" and be sure to read through the reviews. Also be sure to read through all of the negative before booking.

Also be aware that Wombats does not message you back in regards to this.

I have attached screenshots of the the prices that are listed on the their website, and the actual price I paid.

Beware of this.

They replied within a few hours, very friendly and accurate service. I am very impressed and satisfied with it, will come back again :)

Hostelworld is an absolute nightmare! The fees you see when booking are not the ones they actually charge you. When you notice this and try and ask their customer support for help they simply deny it and do nothing about it. Also the utter lack of transparency of the company and how they manage your data is concerning. You can't even delete your account on your own. Don't use it.

I had to cancel a booking immediately after making it since HostelWorld DID NOT show me the hostel's full guest rules/policies until AFTER I paid. Once I was able to read the full policy list, I realized that I would not be able to stay at the hostel and had to look for different accomodations asap. I asked HostelWorld for a refund and they were completely unhelpful and tried to guilt me instead. Said I "should have selected the flexible booking option." Oh really? How come I never saw this option at all or any type of additional insurance while I was booking my stay? So many important details are hidden from their website until you're already stuck with a reservation. This company is a joke that will just steal your money. Please don't waste your time with them and just book with the hostels directly.

They removed their phone number "due to covid 19" (which was 3 years ago).

So you email them, only to receive an auto reply telling you that their email inbox doesn't exist any more.

It tells you that you have to download the app to contact them, which is a joke.

So you download the app and fill out their for. It asks if any of the suggested articles solve your query. You say thay it doesn't and send your message.

Then you get an automated response saying your ticket has been auto solved as it contains the word "cancel" and this topic should be solved by reading an article, even though the article doesn't help.

Then it tells you to respond to the message if your message shouldn't be auto solved and needs a response, so you reply and say it needs a response.

Then you hear back five hours later but not from a human, finally, but from the customer satisfaction survey, telling you that your ticket is solved and asking if you're satisfied.

As a Zendesk consultant who helps teams improve their Zendesk experience, this is literally how I would design their CX flow to piss off as many customers as possible. It's actually hilariously bad.

Except it's not funny, as they still have my money and I want it back. Zendesk ticket *******

I ran into an issue regarding a booking I wanted to push back by a few dates for a pretty legitimate reason. The first date of the booking was just within the 48h free cancellation but the rest of the 8 days were okay. I contacted the hostel first and they said they cannot do anything if booked through them. First red flag with booking through them. So I tried to contact hostel world and since they are based in Ireland only people from there can make calls unless you have an international calling plan, so that leaves me with email. The first email I made through customer care I was sent back an automated email which I had already read on their website that deemed my issue resolved. There fore the customer care had not even got to read it and it was filtered out by a robot for some reason. I had replied to the email with a more detailed description of the help I needed and I received another email back saying the recipient's mailbox was full and cannot accept anymore messages at that time. Clearly there are so many complaints and unresolved issues that they cannot receive anymore. The website and way their customer care is negligent and lazy. 1 star for a non helpful app that doesn't make things flexible for travelers with ongoing changing itineraries.

Call the hostels directly rather than book through this site. Don't be fooled by this corrupt company. I purchased a refundable overnight stay for my daughter as we knew her plans might change. Yet when I cancelled, I was never offered a refund. The hostile said it has nothing to do with Hostelworld.com and cannot refund the monies and Hostelworld.com did not send me a receipt of my cancellation so would be too hard to collect. $24 to learn a lesson I guess. Moral of the story, don't ever use this site again.

If you file a public complaint, HostelWorld makes a smiling public response asking you to send them an email. In truth, that email is blocked, and you have to download an app if you want to talk. Of course if you download, there's just another layer waiting for you.

Hostel world making honest attempts to rectify upgrade 27 Aug