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Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

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Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#61

Post by dudeinjapan »

em500 wrote: post #58
dudeinjapan wrote: post #50

Any Booking.com engineers reading this are welcome to apply to join us a TableCheck ( https://www.tablecheck.com/en/company/jobs/ ) We see Booking.com's online travel agent ("OTA") model as fundamentally predatory/parasitic to hospitality operators. Our business is designed to cut-out of the likes of Booking.com and other middlemen--let the operators own the guest data and build direct relationship with their guests.

They're not firing thousands of engineers. They're transferring most of their thousands of call centre workers to a different company. Are you hiring lots of call center workers? Q. to all you off the cuff commenters: did you even realise that they had thousands of call centre workers?

I'm putting out this message to Booking.com engineers/PMs/etc. who have wisened up to their employer's shenanigans. We aren't in the call center business so don't have any openings there (and yes, was aware of their call center ops, have called myself in the past.)

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#62

Post by olalonde »

It's weird to see all those negative anecdotes about Booking.com. As a counter anecdote, I've used them several times and they always seem to have much cheaper prices then the competition. I was also able to cancel my booking once without issue after talking to customer support. PS: Not in any way affiliated with them other than being a satisfied customer.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#64

Post by tluyben2 »

ww520 wrote: post #20
quickaskq wrote: post #6

The one time I used booking.com I got screwed over. Their website is riddled with dark patterns and has probably been A/B tested into oblivion. The tactic they used that screwed me over was that they advertised 100% refunds on last minute cancellations. I used booking.com for this exact reason as I didn’t know if I’d be staying the night in the city I was driving past. Well turns out I didn’t need the booking but whe…

Book directly with the hotels if possible. Lots of hotels will forgo the 24-hour cancellation charge if you ask nicely. Hotels can't do much if you book with a 3rd party since you're a customer of the 3rd party, not with the hotel.

Hotels.com and some others have reward schemes; while travelling for business, I got 50+ free nights. Booking the hotel directly would need to be at least 10% cheaper and it just is not unless you are a regular or stay very long stretches.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#65

Post by vondro »

Just skimming through the comments, there is some negative sentiment about Booking.com. So I came to say, that over the years, I've used Booking.com numerous times, without any single problem. Yes, there are dark patterns (13 people are looking at this offer right now, etc.), but free cancellation was always free for me, reviews matched my experience, information matched the reality.

Sorry to hear about the layoffs, but customer experience has been great for me.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#66

Post by INTPenis »

jan_Inkepa wrote: post #37
dataengineer56 wrote: post #22

I once booked a room in a reputable international chain hotel through booking.com. My sister (living in a different country) booked the same hotel for the same night for a different price and paid with her card in a different currency. The only "link" between the two bookings was that we booked rooms in the same hotel for the same nights, the bookings were made within an hour of each other, and we share a surname. A…

> Booking.com said "talk to the hotel" and the hotel said "talk to booking.com". I got trapped in a loop there as well, it was pretty wretched. Hotel would only except credit card details sent via plaintext emails (on the phone I couldn't reach anyone at the purported hotel, just a call center, where they couldn't deal with processing), nobody would release me from the obligation to pay, neither booking.com nor the h…

> Hotel would only except credit card details sent via plaintext emails

This seems very common issue in hotel business. I regularly travel with Amex business travel and our travel agency sends a temporary cc# to the hotel so I don't have to pay for the room.

So that's a temporary cc# which is a little safer, but it's e-mailed in cleartext to the hotel regularly for thousands of guests.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#67

Post by MikeDelta »

tluyben2 wrote: post #54
NumberCruncher wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> several of the dark patterns don't The "only x room left with these conditions" false claim is used also in the EU.

Yep, cannot understand people still fall for that though. But I guess if you are a first time user… As it is a lie, it should not be allowed.

Yeah, and 20 people looking at this room, booked 10x in the last hour, last one left.

When you go to the hotel website instead, you see plenty of rooms left and sometimes with a nice offer.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#68

Post by richardfey »

blunte wrote: post #41
ww520 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Book directly with the hotels if possible. Lots of hotels will forgo the 24-hour cancellation charge if you ask nicely. Hotels can't do much if you book with a 3rd party since you're a customer of the 3rd party, not with the hotel.

Several commentors have written this advice, but almost always if I check the hotel website directly I see much higher prices than what are offered on booking. hotels.com, or agoda. However, with flights and flight search websites I do sometimes see close to equal pricing, and in that domain I almost always check the airline website itself and book directly when possible.

Not even once I have seen a higher price on the hotel's website. But I travel mostly to Europe so your experience might be different.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#69

Post by lbriner »

The most annoying dark pattern for me was not being able to give 0 stars for something and then averaging across completely dissimilar topics so that it was impossible for most hotels to score less than about 2 out of 5.

So the location was great, 5 out of 5 but that doesn't make up for the terrible service and the noise 0 out of 5.

Another thing that got me was the window dressing. They show the nicest room of the hotel on the site but the room you get when you arrive is nasty. Booking.com were famous for this kind of stuff and probably helped AirBnB get to where they are.

Re: Booking.com is moving its customer service staff to an outsourcing company

#70

Post by dessant »

quickaskq wrote: post #6

The one time I used booking.com I got screwed over. Their website is riddled with dark patterns and has probably been A/B tested into oblivion. The tactic they used that screwed me over was that they advertised 100% refunds on last minute cancellations. I used booking.com for this exact reason as I didn’t know if I’d be staying the night in the city I was driving past. Well turns out I didn’t need the booking but whe…

Here's a Booking.com employee that was part of the Consumer Psychology Team coming forward and arguing that what they've been doing is not illegal in the EU, after they were forced to change course because what they've been doing was incompatible with the law.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29472233

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29471213

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