Hotels.com review: Unnotified/unauthorised room cancellation

my itinerary No [protected]

Hampton by Hilton, Guarulhos airport, Sao Paolo

on checking in to the hotel I was advised that my room had been cancelled by Hotel.com despite me having paid a 50% deposit on the hotel.com app.

The hotel advised that this deposit had never been received by them and that the expedia group that owns hotel.com did not have an approved method of paying their bill

as my check in was at midnight (Brazillian time) I had no alternative but to re book a room at the hotel reception at considerable additional expense, this 'discussion' was at the hotel reception in front of many other guests and caused quite a lot of awkwardness and embarrassment.

when I used the hotel.com app to make a complaint and find out what had happened, their entire script was only to say she could only see her screen and saw that the room had been cancelled and to say that "I must have cancelled the room the day befor" - regrettably for them I was/am on a work tour around Brazil often without internet or mobile signal and I did not even open the app. - the customer service lady just kept repeating that "the cancellation was from my phone app, so I must have cancelled it". while at the hotel reception, to show the receptionist I tried to rebook the booking only for the app to saw that the hotel needed more than 2 nights to confirm - the receptionist stated that was completley wrong as they often just take 1 night booking due to they being a airport transfer type hotel.