We booked The Treehouse at Escape to East Zion through Hotels.com one month in advance for the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend. My credit card was charged in advance for our room, and we got a confirmation saying that “your booking is guaranteed and all paid for”. Upon showing up, we found another party in the room! The owner of the Treehouse claimed that the room had already been booked when our booking was processed via Hotels.com, and swears that he notified Hotels.com immediately that they needed to cancel our booking. Hotels.com, on the other hand, says they have absolutely no record of being notified of this or of any cancellation. While each side blames the other, all I know is:
We had no room, despite our guaranteed, confirmed booking.
- Nobody ever notified us of any cancellation, if indeed there was one.
- It was virtually impossible to reach a live person at Hotels.com
- On this holiday weekend, we checked many, many places, and there were simply no vacancies that were not ridiculously far away.
- My family and I spent most of the night sleeping in our car.
Upon our return, I called Hotels.com, who argued that it was not their fault, just as the owner claimed it was not his fault. Customers don’t care about finger-pointing. Since the owner chose to partner with Hotels.com to market his property, they share responsibility: we deem both sides to be guilty of negligence and poor service. We will not be booking this property in the future or use Hotel.com.