Has Hotel Connect going bust led to a theft of holidaymakers’ money?
No sooner had I blogged about what a shame it was for Hotel Connect to go bust I now find out that things have gone from bad to worse for some customers. So bad, that in my opinion money has been stolen from customers …..
I have found a couple who traveled to the USA having paid for their holiday in full via Hotel Connect. However while they were on holiday they found that they had been charged for the holiday again. This time by the hotel.
When the customer queried this, the hotel said that they hadn’t received the payment from Hotel Connect and that staff at Hotel Connect had told them to take the payment again from customers. Apparently an e mail had been sent from Hotel Connect instructing this.
The usual procedure would be to tell the customer before they travel and give them the option to pay again or to cancel the holiday. In either case the customer would hopefully be able to claim for the loss on insurance or through schemes such as ATOL. However what is not acceptable is to just take the customer’s money without asking.
The couple in question were still on holiday in Las Vegas and only found out that the money had been taken from their account when they ran out of spending money quicker than they thought!
Personally taking someone else’s money without their authority is surely theft?
It is not theft as when you check in at most hotels, and everyone in the US, you sign a form and hand over your credit card, authorising the hotel to debit any sums owing. Clearly the hotel discovered the voucher the customers had given them was worthless and in a typically American way, ‘protected their own back.’
The real problem with Hotel Connect was that it proudly advertised it was a member of ABTA without also advertising the fact they had chosen, and ABTA had allowed,it to operate without providing any financial protection. ABTA changed its rules 5 years ago to allow companies, who do not sell package holidays which must by law be protected, to opt out of ABTA protection schemes, one of the matters ABTA doesn’t seem so keen on promoting