Hotwire Hotel: 5* London (The City - Tower Bridge) Andaz Liverpool Street London - a Hyatt Hotel

[Athenechi]

Because I’ll have a trip to UK in March end, I keep watching Priceline & Hotwire’s quote since early Feb. On 2/15 I was happy to find that Hotwire showed $86 room-rate for a London 5* hotel (City of London-Tower bridge), so I paid that Hotwire hot-rate deal right away and won the bid. Of course Hotwire sent confirmation letter to me to show the hotel is “Andaz Liverpool Street”.

Just in case, I checked my reservation with Andaz Liverpool St. hotel directly last week, and Andaz hotel also replied my email to confirm the reservation.

However, one Hotwire person called me on 2/22 morning. He told me that my reservation in Andaz is not available, so Hotwire will cancel the deal and refund my payment. I was too shocked and didn’t know how to reply, so I ask him to send me an email as official notice. But I didn’t get that email.

Few hours later, I sent an email to Hotwire Customer Service and asked them to tell me what happened exactly. I also mentioned that Andaz already confirmed my reservation. They did reply, but didn’t answer my question. Here’s a part of their reply: “… I understand you received a call stating that one of you reservation could not be honored. … So we can best assist you, please call us as soon as possible. One of our Customer Care Agents will be happy to review your situation, as well as clarify our policies and procedures. … Keep in mind that certain action are not possible by email, and you still need to call in. …”

I was very angry to see such SOP-style reply, and here’s my reply to them.

“I still don't understand what happened from your reply.

The "term & condition" in your website is very clear to show that" All bookings are final and can't be changed", and that's the rule also applied to Seller. Since it's down payment and I already received the confirmation letter from your company, all the bookings and transactions are valid. It's Seller's duty to fulfill the transaction, and Seller can't change or cancel the deals without Buyer's consent.

If you want to change it, you should send an official notice to me and advise the solution, not ask me to call you. I'm not the one to break the deal, and I can't believe you treat your customer in this way. “

Guess what? Their second email-reply still asked me to call them back without any explanation.

“ So we can best assist you, please call us at 1-866-HOTWIRE (468-9473) to speak with a Customer Care Associate as soon as it is convenient for you. We will be happy to review your situation, as well as clarify our policies and procedures.

If we can be of further assistance, please feel free to reply to this email or call us directly. Thank you for choosing Hotwire, our flights, car rentals, and hotels are backed by a Low Price Guarantee allowing you to Take More Trips. “

I feel tired and wordless, so I didn’t reply them.

Then, they sent the 3rd email to me.

“The Andaz Liverpool Street, London will be unable to honor your reservations. Due to the inconvenience, Hotwire has some options available for you. Please review the following and respond with your decision.

• You may receive a straight refund for your bookings.

• You may fax in your receipt for new accommodations.

• You may contact us by phone and we will assist with booking you a new reservation.

If we can be of further assistance, please feel free to reply to this email or contact us directly by phone.”

It looks they still insist to cancel my reservation in Andaz, and my only choice is to accept one of the options.”

Although it’s sad, it’s my first time to use Hotwire and I learn they don’t have to follow their “no-change, no-cancel rule”.

[thereuare]

Can you please add the details your purchase to the board as a reply to this topic. In your post please include the star rating, city, zone, hotel name, room rate per nite, dates of your stay and amenities shown before your purchase... you can still view all of this information by going to HOTWIRE and clicking the MY ACCOUNT link near the top right of their home page.

We will then add our comments on your situation above.

Thanks!

PS- and please read your messages if you haven't done so already. Thanks.

[Psychowildfire]

I booked the andaz deal too.

3 Days in August.

They called me too, with the same message.

I choosed to rebook to another proberty in London. 5* Grange St.Pauls .

Instead 269$ for 3 nights the cost are now 600$.

But the difference was paid by Hotwire and the best is , that the new reservation is refundable.

So i am satisfied with this solution.

[Athenechi]

My bidding in Hotwire is as below

London 5* Hotel

Zone : City of London-Tower Bridge-St. Paul's Cathedral

Price : US$86 (before tax and fee)

Date : Check in 3/30, Check out 4/2

Hotel Amenities: Fitness Center, Restaurant(s), Business Center, High-Speed Internet Access

No customer rating information.

Result : Andaz Liverpool Street - Hyatt Hotel

However, the reservation was success but cancelled by Hotwire one week later.

[thereuare]

Thanks for the details of your purchase.

As per HOTWIRE's instructions why don't you call them as indicated instead of trying to resolve thru email, as i'm sure the process will go more smoothly speaking 'live' then corresponding back and forth as you're attempting to do.

From their email, and the reply of the other user above:

• You may fax in your receipt for new accommodations.

• You may contact us by phone and we will assist with booking you a new reservation.

It does seem like they are attempting to resolve the issue in some way, even by perhaps booking another 5* hotel and them paying the difference (but you'll need to confirm to find out exactly what they are/aren't willing to do.

While i understand your frustration keep in mind how things work behind the scenes and given we're seeing multiple reservations at this same hotel get cancelled, that it's the hotel that is not honoring the reservation, not HOTWIRE (but you're HOTWIRE's customer so they are the ones that you need to deal with to resolve it). There are multiple reasons why a hotel may now need/want to cancel your reservation (wrong room rate entered by the hotel and they refuse to honor the price, pipe burst or some other condition rendering a large block of rooms unusable and therefore they need to cancel some guests, mistakenly offered inventory when none existed, etc, etc.) Whatever the reason, HOTWIRE was originally told that there were rooms available at the hotel and booked you into one of them, now they are being told the hotel can't/won't honor the reservation. Since HOTWIRE doesn't own or have control of inventory of rooms at the hotel there isn't too much they can do other than work with you to find a equitable solution, so i would call them (as they've requested) and see if you can come to some sort of agreement.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.