Fake bookings from Booking.com
Hello all.
As of this morning, we are up to 9 fake bookings over the last three weeks and we believe they are all from Booking.com, trying to worm their way out of meeting their own Smartflex cancellation obligations. The names are a nonsense (particularly when related to the supposed countries of origin), the phone numbers are all incorrect or unobtainable and they are all no-shows.... We only get them towards the end of the virtual card charging period for guests who have cancelled due to COVID, family bereavement etc. (most of whom re-booked later in the summer).
I've raised this with 'Customer dis-service' and they are not doing anything. "The system says....", "we cannot cancel the booking because it might be genuine...." are the two most common responses I get. But this leaves our rooms blocked and us unable to sell them via any other channel. It started after we declined their new card validation service to "prevent fake bookings" (quoted from their marketing email) and stinks of a cynical action on their part to force users into taking away payment options from guests. Is anyone else seeing this behaviour at all, and if so, any ideas on what to do about it will be gratefully received :-)
Also, if anyone has found where the option is buried in the Partner Centre to switch off Smartflex nonsense, please do let me know :-)
Have a great weekend everyone
KB
This is nothing to do with smart flex .... it's to do with you taking bookings without taking payment at the time of booking .... it's a common and well known problem .....
Always use Payments by Booking.com to take payment at the time of booking, just as you would with AirBnB or any other booking channel ....... this stops the fake bookings
As for Smart Flex .... well that's another mess that BDC have introduced, creating yet more problems .....
Hi and thanks for your comments. We have lots of French guests who prefer to pay by cheque or cash so what's your point? Not sure if you got the fact that all these fake bookings are coming to try and assuage Smartflex obligations... it actually says something like "our obligations to meet the smartflex requirements to find replacement bookings are now fulfilled" in the booking email we get from Booking.con. So they are very clearly linked, no?
You haven't addressed the fake bookings being made... just insinuated that it's our fault for some reason?
And many guests do give their full card details, it's just that with the Smartflex system, Booking.con does not share the CCV numbers so we couldn't take a payment anyway :-(
Thanks again for sharing your thoughts.
Here's the thing .... this was happening before Smart Flex .... and it's nothing to do with Smart Flex .... search this community for "no show" and "fake bookings" etc, you'll see the same things again and again .... what's happened to you has happened to thousands of others.
Don't confuse bookings with "paid bookings". BDC will get you a "booking", and if you don't take payment up front like on AirBnB, this is what happens. It really is as simple as that.
And whatever country people come from, we require them to pay up front with Payments by Booking.com. They all do that, even those from France.
Yes I am seeing this and directly linked to when I opted in to Smart Flex reservations. We used to use B.com then stopped when the level of awful guests breaking things just wasn't worth it. This year we decided to trial them again since the market dropped.
We are in the UK and our first Smart Flex reservation got cancelled days before the stay. (Surpise surprise!)
Booking.com then partially filled the dates with 2 bogus looking bookings. 1 night stays from Canadian and American guests. Fake phone numbers and strange names. Very fishy. I've been assured over the phone with C Service that regardless, we will get paid. I certainly hope so.
The other thing I've noticed is that this year we are getting lots of bookings but 99% cancel in quick succession. This is ridiculous. What's going on?
Update, C Service lied! I am currently trying to get them to pay for the fake bookings as per their Smart Flex obligations. Anyone reading this, stay well away from this. B.Con is awful.