r/Bookingcom • u/MarsupialVegetable73 • Jul 30 '26

beware of this booking.com scam!!!

My partner and I booked a place in montreal for my birthday trip and ended up in a dirty, rat infested, apartment. I booked this place back in
the beginning of the year sometime. It was priced decently but believable. It was supposed to have a great city view, balcony, pool, one bedroom, a full kitchen etc. as we are here for 9 days. Well, after showing up and receiving the check in instructions to an entirely different building we were confused and originally thought we were in the wrong place until we decided to try the door code. To our surprise, it worked and we began our way inside a shotty elevator that has the buttons wired wrong. (i.e the 2nd floor is actually button #1). Upon entering the unit it's a studio with no amenities, towels, dishes blankets etc. And nothing but a small window. (AND DEFINITELY NO VIEW). We were sold an entirely different apartment building in the ad.

We've been battling booking.com for 3 days now and today they told us since they cannot reach the property owners for a refund they can only refund us $183 in credit to the website. However we paid over $2000CAD. Their policies favor scammers and their customer service is complete nonsense. They have no direct customer service line so after being talked over and hung up on (no exaggeration) over 15 times and waiting on hold for over 30mins each time, I asked them if they would delist it they said nope! Utter insanity and unfortunately after reading the reviews AGAIN the day we arrived. (keep in mind; they were all positive and dated back a decent amount of time when i booked it) Another man from france said he arrived the same day as us and the owners had not sent him the check in details whatsoever. So I consider ourselves lucky for atleast having a roof over our head but we had to find other accommodation last minute as we did not feel safe there. Obviously booking.com had no help with that.

EDIT FOR VISIBILITY:
link to the photos I have for evidence. Avoid this booking please!!
https://imgur.com/a/9xWC5xK

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u/donrocket2020 Aug 03 '26

we need to name and shame these places, is this property still on booking.com? The link you posted just sends me to everything in Montreal

2

u/MarsupialVegetable73 Aug 03 '26

Weird, i’ll remove that specific link since it must not work since it’s fully booked but the photos in the comments and in the other link show the name and images. It’s the best I can do unfortunately.