Fraudsters impersonate hotels at booking.com

The Belgian Consumer Organization Testaankoop warns against fraudsters who impersonate hotels on the booking.com platform and extort money from customers. In many cases, regaining funds turns out to be impossible.

Testaankoop has recorded over 100 complaints about fraud related to accommodation reservations through a popular platform.

Fraudsters break into hotel accounts, and then impersonate them and send messages – often through the Booking system – asking for confirmation of payment. The victims click on the given link and lose their money, believing that they communicate directly with the accommodation object.

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Criminals have access to the reservation data, such as name and surname, reservation number, date of stay and phone number. This makes the messages look credible. In other cases, travelers book accommodation in places that turn out to be not existing – they are often copied offers from other platforms, e.g. Airbnb.

Testaankoop advises that after receiving a message with a request for payment, always contact the hotel with another channel and not pay through the links sent. In case of fraud suspected, the bank should be notified as soon as possible and report the case to the police.

Experts warn that in many cases it may not be possible to recover money. If the payment has been made by credit card, you can try to make a complaint by the chargeback system.

Also in the Netherlands, where Booking has its headquarters, the first warnings appeared, including on the part of the consumerenbond organization.

Patryk Kulpok (PAP)

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