I was scammed via booking.com

But if an AirBnB goes wrong, well, you could be waiting…that’s the trade off.

Or worse! There have been reports of bait-and-switch scams using AirBNB (though it's by no means an AirBNB only thing) where the apartment provider makes contact on the day of travel to let you know that there's been a problem with the lovely apartment you booked (flooded or fire damaged) and they can either refund you or accommodate in a "similar" apartment. If you agree, then they have it recorded in the AirBNB conversation that you're agreeing to it. Of course the replacement apartment is 20km out of town and in a fleapit. It's another variant of the advance fee fraud.
 
So I got the runaround from Booking.com
They kept sending me the same response which, although it was signed with a person's name, I assume it was AI generated. It made no reference to previous emails.

But on Monday, the money arrived back in my account with the wording "VDP - Refund Re FRAU"

I presume that AIB has charged it back to the payment company. Or maybe they have just taken the hit.

If I had paid by Revolut, I would not have got it back.
 
It's been so long since the start of this but am I right in saying you paid by credit card ? If so how is the scammer able to get this as Visa or MC company will just not pay it ?
 
I have just received the scam message on Whatsapp regarding a booking.com reservation.
I went into the booking on the app and requested that they send the confirmation email again.
They did so I ignored the whatsapp message but reported it to booking.com.
Their customer service is terrible.
They asked for information they already had and I had already sent them.
They asked me to call them. I refused.
The last time this happended, they took no responsibility and kept me on the call, going round in circles until I gave up, having paid for the call.
This time I asked if they had reported this data breach and scam to the EU under GDPR legislation. No answer.
Only booking.com and I had my personal and travel details. If the hotel has them, booking.com gave them to them. I did not and I did not leak my details.
Why hasn't the EU or Interpol or booking.com not done anything about this widespread and lucrative scam?
If only 1 in a 1000 are caught, it is still big business.
It is time for someone to take responsibility.
 
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