COLOSSEUM CORNER

Bello

Ruined the start of our family trip to Europe. Our booking was cancelled without notice. We got one call from the property overnight (due to the time difference) and then a few days later the booking was cancelled. We weren't even aware until we coincidently logged into Expedia to check something else and noticed our hotel reservation in Rome was cancelled. We rushed to call Expedia first to get some help, they notified us that the booking was cancelled by the property and there is NO correspondence that they can see in their system. As for us, we also received NO email or text update about this cancellation. We then reached out to the property and spoke with their rep, Christopher who advised that the reservation was cancelled due to the payment method not going through. We explained that this is normal because we live in Canada and they likely tried to put the charge overnight (in Canada) due to the time difference and it probably got flagged as fraud. The normal next step would have been to contact us and authorize the payment over the phone to ensure it goes through. Or at least let us know so we can inform the payment provider to not block any international payments. The key thing to note here is that the booking was 100% payable at the property, and not in advance. If we had any idea they plan on charging weeks before the trip, we would have ensured the payment provider is notified and the authorization goes through. This is a very important point for the hotel to understand. You cannot cancel a booking based on a payment not getting authorized considering these are international payments and most payment providers are very fraud conscious these days. And if you must have the payment ahead of time, then you need to inform the guest well ahead of time OR alternatively, do NOT offer a reservation that is fully refundable and payable at the hotel. It is contradicting and extremely unprofessional. Lastly, there are some other reviews where this has happened to other guests and the hotel response mentions that they called numerous times to get payment - this is NOT true. They only called ONCE and in our case, it was overnight, hence we were bound to miss the call. And most people will not even recognize the phone number. This is why such communication is usually more appropriate and reliable through an email channel. In my opinion, this is a good strategy to give the hotel a reason to cancel the booking last minute as they can then rebook at a much higher rate during peak season.

Horrible experience dealing with this hotel. My confirmed reservation was cancelled less than two weeks before my arrival without any notification. Booking was completed through Expedia about 2.5 months in advance, it was fully refundable and payable at the property. Seems they cancelled our booking to get a guaranteed reservation at a much higher rate. This is extremely unprofessional in the hotel business - someone travelling 1000s of miles away must be able to trust a confirmed booking. We had to pay almost three times the price to book another hotel in the same area due to the last minute booking and we had no other choice considering all travel plans were set in motion. I spoke with Christopher at the hotel for assistance, he was unable to help in anyway and was quick to inform us that our room has been rebooked already. Please beware and be careful booking at this hotel - and if you must, do not choose the fully refundable option (despite the hotel offering it).