TripAdvisor and Trivago Criticized after Cancelations of Hotel-Booking Site

Customers lashed out at travel websites TripAdvisor and Trivago for advertising booking website HotelQuickly, which canceled reservations with no refund. Last December, thousands of customers who booked hotels through HotelQuickly had their reservations suddenly canceled. The customers received an e-mail from HotelQuickly, which claimed that their bookings were canceled by the company’s suppliers. When customers contacted their hotels, some hotels claimed that they never received payments from HotelQuickly. Other hotels said that the reservations were canceled by a third party. Instead of a refund, HotelQuickly gave customers discount vouchers for their next booking. However, some customers complained that there are either no hotels accepting the vouchers or the vouchers were no longer usable. Some customers are pointing the finger at TripAdvisor and Trivago for leading them to HotelQuickly. TripAdvisor shows travel-related content, such as restaurant reviews and accommodation bookings. On the other hand, Trivago allows customers to compare hotel prices. Following the cancelations, customers called on TripAdvisor and Trivago to quickly remove HotelQuickly from their websites and address the issue. Some people were frustrated because of the companies’ slow response to customer concerns. Others said that their trust in the travel sites was broken and urged TripAdvisor and Trivago to protect their customers from online scams. TripAdvisor responded to the complaints by suspending HotelQuickly from its website. The company advised customers with upcoming bookings to directly contact their hotels and confirm their reservations. Additionally, TripAdvisor told customers to contact their credit card providers to dispute or block hotel charges. Similarly, Trivago removed HotelQuickly from its website and directed customers to its Help Center for concerns.