Wrongly Charged Cancellation Fee

jaakul

Myself and a group of friends recently stayed in a Galway based hostel for a weekend.

Originally I had booked a room to myself but after one person dropped out of the trip I rang up the Hostel and asked to cancel my room and stayed in the bigger room with the others.

The member of staff I spoke to said this was no problem, I was within the cancellation deadline and no cancellation fee / no-show fee would be applied.

After checking my statement I've discovered I've been charged a 93 euro no-show fee.

After contacting the manager now on numerous occasions he is now point-blank refusing to return this fee, his argument is that I never got in touch with the Hostel to cancel my booking and that he has no record of any cancellation instruction.

I have never had any expierience in anything like this and was wondering if there was anyone else on boards that has come across this kind of situation...

Dont have a breeze what avenue to go down next, this chap is just refusing to listen to me.

Nody

jaakul wrote: »

Dont have a breeze what avenue to go down next, this chap is just refusing to listen to me.

I'll assume you have no idea who you spoke with but get hold of your detailed phone bill and fax over the page with the call on the date you made it as back up of the fact you called in. The fact his staff did not record that fact when you called is not your fault (though once again he may ignore it and claim that no such request was done).

GerardKeating

Nody wrote: »

I'll assume you have no idea who you spoke with but get hold of your detailed phone bill and fax over the page with the call on the date you made it as back up of the fact you called in. The fact his staff did not record that fact when you called is not your fault (though once again he may ignore it and claim that no such request was done).

If the hotel do not agree that a call was made, the CC card company might see differently and do a chargeback...

Cabaal

If you have a copy of you phone bill this will show that you were in contact with the hostel, he can debate it all he wants but that proves contact so his argument that you didn't ring them is out the window.

I'd give him one more warning and advise him that you'll be doing a chargeback for incorrect charges otherwise,

Could also threaten will small claims I guess to

jaakul

Thanks for the feedback, much appreciated. Have obtained a call report log from admin in work, which details everything.

Will send this on and see if the manager im in contact with changes his tack, although in the last correspondance he was dismissive to the point of insulting tbh. If not I guess ill be getting in touch with AIB Credit Card services.

Thanks again

JimsAlterEgo

the time of the call should also allos them see who was on duty

Le_Dieux

jaakul wrote: »

Thanks for the feedback, much appreciated. Have obtained a call report log from admin in work, which details everything.

Will send this on and see if the manager im in contact with changes his tack, although in the last correspondance he was dismissive to the point of insulting tbh. If not I guess ill be getting in touch with AIB Credit Card services.

Thanks again

If it's ok with the moderators here, I, for one, would ask the name of this hostel be published so I can give it a wide berth. I go to Galway on business fairly regularly so would like to make sure an establishment like this is not given my business.

Please Jaakul, keep us informed of the outcome of this., and good luck in Your persuit of 'justice'.

dudara

Le_Dieux wrote: »

If it's ok with the moderators here, I, for one, would ask the name of this hostel be published so I can give it a wide berth. I go to Galway on business fairly regularly so would like to make sure an establishment like this is not given my business.

No, it's not OK to publish the name of the hotel. However, the OP can send it to you via PM.

dudara

jaakul

Been out of the country past few weeks sorry for lack of update til now.

I got back to the manager with the call logs, still nothing out of him so got in touch with AIB. Ppl in there were very helpful, asked me to process an official chargeback/reversal request, send in all of the details along with any proof relating to the incident which I did.

Got back in there monday morning to see that the transaction had been reversed, chuffed with the outcome.

Got in contact with AIB, they apparantely got in touch with the hostel manager themselves and informed him of my request, asked him what his response was (he had none..) and he agreed to reverse the transaction himself right there and then.

Unbelieveable that all of this was required when the fcuker knew he was in the wrong the whole time along, also dont understand how after giving him so much business he has just decided to completely alienate myself and everyone involved on that trip from ever using his hostel ever again too.

Anyways big thanks for the previous advice, much appreciated. Anyone that wants to know what hostel this was just PM me, might save you a headache some stage in the future.

Cabaal

Great to hear you had a good outcome, I'd imagine the manager got to the stage where he knew he was in the wrong but didn't want to give in and refund you as it would make it look like he lost.

By him dealing with AIB he didn't have to deal with you so likely saved face...or atleast in his view

All in all very poor form from that manager,

TheDriver

make sure you write a nice tripadvisor review for the place......

jor el

TheDriver wrote: »

make sure you write a nice tripadvisor review for the place......

+Blog, Facebook, twitter, etc. The word will get out fairly quickly.

GSOIRL

Fair play and well done on getting the money back.

I had a similar problem with a hostel in South Africa. I contacted AIB and they were more than unhelpful. They were rude and basically claimed it was my fault. Case went all the way to the FSO and the data protection(as Visa had sent me other people's credit card details).

I went onto Hostelworld.com and hostels.com to write reviews.

Hostelworld is an Irish company and were very helpful. Lots of other people had complained about this hostel and it's been taken off both sites. Defo write a review on the 2 websites mentioned even though they take bad reviews down after a time.