Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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I heard of people getting banned from booking.com due to muntiple cancellations. Is this actually possible? It says nothing, absolutely nothing about that in Terms and Conditions, yet there are some threads online by people claiming they were banned. When traveling in covid times, it's neat to have muntiple bookings at different places, and being able to cancel those that are in certain countries if the countries close their borders, and choosing the ultimate destination in a country that is still open. Could this be considered suspecious activity or just normal travel planning?
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Sydney, Australia
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1.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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Yes absolutely possible and it’s not just exclusive to Booking.com - it’s all mainstream OTA’s.
No, your situation is quite safe. There has to be repeat patterns of multiple bookings in a given location, which is booked and cancelled. In a given destination during periods of heavy demand, having a person holding X number of rooms at Y number of hotels, can actually impact availability and rates
Another way you can be banned, is from making reservations and having your CC declined repeatedly. This is accumulative based on complaints from numerous properties
Edited: 2 years ago
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2.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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Thank you for reply! And if you get banned, what happens with existing bookings including those that are already paid?
But I get it, there has to be a pattern. Also we are not talking about last minute cancellations here, but months or many weeks in advance. Probably I am not the only one doing it like this in these times. Recently I had one booking in Hungary and one booking in Sweden (my own country) at the same time, but then Hungary closed the borders so it was very good that I still had a booking at a different location I could go to.
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3.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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Prepaid existing reservations are maintained, provided the hotels themselves do not cancel it. Having no access to the platform itself makes no difference to an active reservation, as the OTA has no authority to cancel it. Only the hotel does.
Whether it’s being banned or having issues with existing reservations, the priority is always to contact the hotel directly first. Everything else can be followed up later
Edited: 2 years ago
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4.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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I was banned for about a year after I made many reservations, (maybe 12-20?), and then cancelled them. At the time, I was booking for travel at least 3-5 months ahead of time, and didn't hold on to any reservation more than a few days.
At the time, I didn't know that this behavior would be punished, and as I'm an avid hunter of lodging, I thought it wouldn't hurt anyone if I booked the room I thought I liked until I found something that I liked better...and with more searching, I kept finding rooms I liked better.
Booking.com didn't tell me when I became un-banned---but after about a year of not using them, I tried booking a room, and it went through.
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5.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
It's very strange then that they don't say anything about this in Terms and Conditions. If it's against the rules, they really should say something about it.
I think booking.com is the best for budget and no frills accommodation in Europe, more than often it is cheaper than booking directly with the place you are staying at.
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Wales, United...
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6.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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I'm not sure that it needs to be spelt out that if your actions could be construed as abuse, there could be a range of sanctions applied to an account. I imagine that it would be difficult to quantify every possible way that someone could find themselves in trouble, for example, how many bookings and subsequent cancellations would it take to trigger a red flag, a warning or a ban?
I personally can understand why the platform would want to have some discretion about what they do and when. The vast majority of travellers will never get close to triggering anything in my view.
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7.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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Well said, RojBlake. On a side note, it didn't occur to me that there are actually people making multiple bookings with no intention of keeping them. Just when you thought you have heard and seen it all...lol.
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8.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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There are people who plan multi-location trips far in advance, but haven't decided yet in specifically which locations to stay in or how long to stay, so as they change their minds they change accomodations, e.g cancelling and then booking at another location, muntiple times. This is not abuse in my opinion, but if it is in their opinion (the OTA) they should also clearly state so.
Edited: 2 years ago
Wales, United...
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9.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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>>>This is not abuse in my opinion<<<
That's my point, really. It's hard to define where abuse really starts. I wouldn't say your example was abuse, but perhaps BDC would. Or perhaps it would depend on how many times multiple is in reality, at least from their point of view.
I admit I have booked refundable rate sin order to have somewhere to stay, and have then changed my mind later. That's fair enough to me. What I'd say isn't so usual, is a person booking a dozen hotels for the same dates, and then making a decision as to which one to stay at much later on, and cancelling all of he other options.
That's my definition of abuse, but again, it may not be yours or BDC's.
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10.Re: Is it possible to get banned from booking.com?
2 years ago
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If that's the case I should be fine. And so far after years of travelling with this type of planning, I haven't really had any issues with them. The only reason I wondered was cause I heard of other people getting banned for reasons related to cancellations. The only issue I had was a few years ago when a property owner at booking.com got extremely angry at me in a private message because I made a few changes in number of days to stay but ultimately ended up cancelling the stay because I found a different place. He claimed this was abuse but nothing happened to my account.
Edited: 2 years ago
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