One click in Booking com interface can ruin a vacation or why a working rating system is important

So, the intermediary service has rules and most customers follow them. It would seem that if you break them, you will be banned, hunger and bankruptcy. So only in theory, there is a certain percentage of users of the service that thrives and lives on, “pumps” its rating in all possible ways and avoids negative ratings with dirty game methods.



It seems that I have an idea why the service intermediary will not fight with such players - life on commissions from successful "freebies" is very good, a large number of transactions, additional payment for the rating and disclaimer of responsibility for the situation. This is a certain niche in which the “worms” have no equal, where you can earn good money from “manure”. It’s a very convenient business to block the ability to leave a review and manage your reservation, to survive noise and unhygienic stuffiness with amber mold and not only, do not return the money in any case, and return the vacated rooms again - PROFIT.

Honest methods of play are the destiny of an expensive reputation - higher costs, longer payback periods and less profit. The freedom of users depends on the desires of several large service owners, faceless moderators and support services. They fight for the reputation of the service and word of mouth only at the very beginning of entering the market, then all this turns into a consumable in exchange for money.

I will divide the publication into parts - theoretical about the state of the industry and practical examples from the user experience on the basis of which this theory appeared. First of all, I wish readers that none of the described situations happen to you. But if suddenly happened, then warned - means armed.

For the most part, I have prepared several publications on the topic of emulating the AWS stack in the JVM, comparing big data solutions for analytical processing of large volumes of biomedical information and on the transformation of loosely structured data in the ETL process memory. I'll be back to github soon and will share my experience, but I'll start with a more vital situation for users of online services - the topic of customer support.

User Support Theory

In fairness, there are areas in which the support service brings the main profit of the company and doesn’t save much on it - this is paid support for open source programs. If in this area the clients are treated as well, they will scatter to competitors or buy alternative proprietary software. And here, like nowhere else, ideally structured work processes, preventive monitoring, maintaining a knowledge base on incidents, work on proactive quality control are important - to prevent the problem and minimize its possible consequences.

But with the auxiliary role of the support service, it is more important to minimize the time spent working with each client - these are costs, it’s not even necessary to solve the situation, you can simply postpone the problem “in the long box” and create a situation in all possible ways so that the client himself stops spending valuable time for employees. The most persistent can be eliminated by using ten-minute music playback on the phone for their own money. Whatsapp, web chat, internet telephony and other ways to minimize the cost of seeking help? No, they didn’t hear, bear it!

Only the weakest in this food chain is obliged to abide by the rules - a client who has only the right to dial into the “psychological assistance” service, into which the support service has actually degenerated. Where instead of solving a problem you will be exhausted by ten minutes of waiting in roaming for each call “very important for us”, explaining the situation to each new operator of the service again and again.

And like a cherry on the cake - a poor understanding of your speech, especially in the conditions of interference on the line, an employee who, at the slightest distortion of the connection, will answer “I don’t understand you”, breaking the line and again tens of minutes of waiting for another operator. With the hope of luck, the soft call center should be associated with a well-understood employee. And the support service operators, in fact, are not to blame for such a load on them, why many are trying to play pin-pong with customers. In my opinion, this is more a consequence of the economy strategy, the approved corporate rules and the KPI management and staff aligned with them.

Is the result of the work of supporting the money you paid for roaming worth the time and effort spent if the problems are not solved, but only the appearance of a solution process is created?

The system of reputation, ratings and reviews of real users of the service in the online space is very important. So that someone, having suffered from malicious actions, warned the others and other people did not get into the same nuisance. Apparently, the cries of victims appeared in nature, when attacked by predators, as a way to survive or avoid damage to other members of the pack. And it seems that there is still no universal solution to this problem on the Internet. Too much still needs to be done so that the ratings are not like in China - totalitarian-governmental and centralized. It is possible to use the blockchain and trust in information that has been researched in the field of decentralized semantic web.

Even the appearance of the problems I am talking about is affected by the law of large numbers. I often used the online service booking com. And at the very beginning, everything went smoothly, without any problems. But time goes on, the online service dominates the market and the service in my experience is gradually deteriorating. A soulless, formal examination of applications “for show” can destroy all the positive experience that this service provides overnight.

Only the emergence of a comparable in scale, decentralized service with a well-thought-out rating system can save the situation? I think the described situation is more general and conceptual, applies to all major online services, not only to booking accommodation for travel.

“Your call is very important to us”, many heard this phrase hanging for minutes on a telephone line. And they received in response, "the application is registered" "we are working on it."

Why do we need a customer support service - to quickly respond to calls and help the regime close to "real time" in resolving problems. This is a type of service by the user.

And on the part of the business, the support service minimizes the risks to its existence. This division in many companies does not bring direct profit and is therefore one of the first candidates for savings, tightening belts. Each region has its own list of problems to be solved, but the reputation of the company depends on the work of the first support lines, minimizing possible legal costs.

Ideal for owners if the service is just an intermediary and almost does not answer for anything, but receives 20-30% of each transaction. The ideal model that is now observed in online taxi services, real estate booking, insurance, trade. And in any controversial situation of "smooth bribe" - solve the problems yourself. And the root of evil, in my opinion, lies in the centralization and monopolization of the industry, in the absence of any responsibility. You can continue to save on support and create a thousand and one ways, well known in bureaucratic circles, to make it easier to ignore the problem than to actually solve it.

Nobody even considers the malicious intent of actions if you look at the options for choosing answers in online claims forms.

Life examples

What is NoShow I first learned when I was developing an aviation security system. It turns out that you can do the same for the client’s reservation in the hotel’s interface on booking.com. Even if the client checked into the hotel on time and paid for the stay, the hotel can mark it as “not showing up for the stay”. And you do not have the opportunity to regain the legal and standard rights of the service - manage the reservation, leave a review about the stay. And they won’t help you, the support service will not fulfill

update client_booking set no_show=false where conformation_no=***666***;

And if the hotel staff deliberately deprived the client of their rights, they will not voluntarily return your reservation and accommodation status and the hotel is a solid plus - you do not need to pay a commission to the intermediary.

Just a hotel employee clicks on the booking interface that


In my opinion, their model is simple - for an average market price for a given location, they rent numbers


converted into a “four star hotel” MayaFair Design Hotel with a positive rating on booking.com.

Checked in an hour before check-in and paid for a room where then spent the night 2 nights, in the stuffiness without ventilation, with a smell of mold, almost complete lack of soundproofing, lack of insolation according to sanitary rules and a toilet in the room, without isolation of the bathroom, the atmosphere of which communicates with the relaxation area and bed!


If they did not wind up the rating and not mark a real visit to real customers, I’m sure that their rating would quickly drop to zero and they would be renamed a rooming house with a price tag corresponding to the living conditions. When living in such conditions for 11 nights, I’m not sure that even people with healthy lungs would not have health problems. I started coughing, the musty air in the room and the smell of mold did their job almost instantly. Fortunately, the smell of mold has not yet been learned to transmit over the Internet and there is no PCIe Smells blaster card.

I started communication with the support service with an attempt to restore the active status of my reservation. I sent photos of the check about payment, photos of the hotel, reception, rooms that I really live there. After a couple of hours, an employee came to meet me and showed me a room, with the same lack of ventilation, with a strong smell of disinfectants in the air and a smaller area, without a bathroom, only with a shower and exactly the same glass wall and a door to the common corridor. The problems are the same, but the number under the conditions is not better. I refused. She began to give me carte blanche on the hotel letterhead so that I would put my signature on it, which I also refused.


I consulted with a friend who worked in hotels with education in this area and she has excellent English. She asked several questions about the reservation, whether there was a deposit and whether money was debited from me before arrival. Her advice helped the most, although she believed that booking was on the client side and in such a situation with obvious hotel violations, that the situation would be decided by a full refund. She just worked in an international chain of hotels that value her reputation.

Several times I called the support service about leaving and returning money for days not lived there. He sent photos of the worst option that I was offered instead of the original terrible number.

Employee Irina from booking offered to talk with the hotel staff and hint to them that since they noted that I hadn’t “visited” them, I could pay a fine of $ 59, return the money and go for it. Of those who tried to do something in the support service, I will highlight Irina, Timur and Alexander. There was no result, but at least they suggested what should be sent in support of booking com in the mail. Although who reads it there and why they need it, in the end did not understand.

Upon seeing me, the hotel employee turned on the “I don’t decide anything on return” mode, which is decided by the hotel manager, that she will arrive after 2:30 PM and that she does not have her phone and cannot say anything definite without her. After that I turned on the Russo tourist mode - that it’s not my problems, but hers, that time is running out and we are not going to pay for another day due to the fact that it is incompetent and does not solve anything. I learned that they are led by a certain Janet Castillo.

When she came and began to communicate with her and was imbued with what kind of demagogue she was one hundred and first level. I began to persuade that we have no problems, that booking a reservation is not important for us, and also a review on accommodation, that there is no money back and there will not be, “rest” why do you need these clarifications of relations. Still, she would have made a refund to us only if they had written off double payment from us. Switching the discussion to this imaginary situation,


We did not receive a single paper that we live there on letterhead from the hotel staff. What can settle us in another hotel (apparently Green16, located 3km from the beach area), and all the rooms are occupied in this. I refused and demanded a refund, as we were not offered anything safe for staying at the MayaFair Design hotel paid for upon arrival. Then Janet Castillo began to talk about her vast experience and concepts in a separate business, here I could not stand it, expressed to her face that she was lying and focused on her


As you might imagine, she disappeared as soon as possible when other clients approached the reception. At that moment, my girlfriend looked into the computer of the "boy" from the reception and showed him my e-mails to the hotel with questions that no one answered and our cancellation by them.

He rented other apartments for 9 nights, since there was a supply of funds just in case. In the evening we went to the reception and the "boy" who settled us started advising us to "help us", saying that they could fire him for this. In an atmosphere of secrecy, hiding from the cameras, he held out a hotel registration form with my details and a paragraph on non-refundable booking. And he said that if I sign it, and on the back of the questionnaire I will describe problems by hand, he will send this paper to the booking and this will solve “our problems”. I refused the refund policy. All conversations with staff were always recorded by their surveillance video camera. It is also very difficult to discuss such situations in English, since I have a vocabulary mainly in the IT field, and not in the tourism business and not jurisprudence.

After another letter to the booking that no one was doing anything and left us abroad, one on one with this hotel in our problems, I received a letter from Irina that the refund process was started on their part and that we would not waste time communicating with the hotel staff who do not cooperate and do not respond to their letters too. After that, we handed over the electronic keys, although for a day we were living in other apartments with normal ventilation, comfortable and safe living conditions. There was hope for a return.

Returning the keys was also the same show - the employee at the reception refused to give any papers that we lived there, said she would not give invoice because there is a check for payment by credit card (and the hotel is called differently in it). She also obsessively tried to give me their signature form for signature, where there is a clause on non-refundable booking. The only thing I was able to officially get her permission to videotape is that she accepts the keys and that forces her to sign the questionnaire. In response, she also recorded a video with us on her phone. A similar situation was when booking the same wonderful booking service in Anapa, when in fact we were not settled, but simply tried to rent a room twice as expensive. And in this case, too, you can not leave a review for the hotel. I got a response from booking already in the Russian Federation - the hotel does not want to return the money,


There is still an assumption that booking covers MayaFair Design not only because of money, but because this resort area is filled with all-inclusive hotels that do not want to share their profit with booking. Or, indeed, this participation in the privileged program is paid by this "hotel" in full. Then this is the price for any antiservice and booking turn a blind eye to almost all the problems there. Sometimes booking clints come to a desolate building instead of a hotel.

There were also a couple of cases where booking a hotel reservation was canceled by the hotel due to exotic methods of payment by bank transfer, which could not be carried out in the online bank alpha click. It’s good that these problems didn’t deprive the visa (when applying for which I made these reservations). And the support service could not do anything - pay directly to the hotel. Then I just booked on AirBnB and paid through this service, which gave guarantees against such payment problems. But prices there are often higher and fewer offers.

Not a single booking. Another example of a service is online insurance for travelers abroad in Ingosstrakh, which the girl bought in the month of January. Health insurance included the risks associated with skiing and snowboarding. Unfortunately, the insured event occurred - she injured a rib in the fall. With her tears, slowly, but we were lucky to get to housing from the slopes on our own without calling the rescue service. In order not to spend on roaming, contacted by email. The only option that we were offered on New Year's holidays is to get to the hospital on our own, 70 km from the place where we were in the mountains. Although it is a ski resort and emergency rooms on every corner. With the help of painkillers, they reached the Russian hospital and an X-ray, upon returning from the mountains. It’s good that in fact there was a bruise, not a fracture! Did we like the service? Was the problem that was contacted by the insurer service resolved? Only in vain spent money on insurance.

Another example is the failure of a dispute with RESO during treatment under VHI insurance “a tooth is more than half damaged” . The doctor does not inform that the second appointment will be paid and treatment with a dubious prospect. The insurance pulls the rubber and brings the decision to the doctors, the clinic claims that the insurance does not pay for this decision in any case and they are forced to make such decisions. As a result, I do CT gums for my money and at the TsNIIS ChLH Institute the doctor removes this tooth according to indications. At my current job, with access to a modern high-resolution intraoral 3d scanner, I had objective methods to measure almost all possible indexes of tooth decay with high accuracy.

Many people got burned from the actions of Google algorithms in the Play market and even inGoogle Safe Browsing . I have not encountered this yet, but it is clear that any small business based on online services or mobile applications can instantly become a victim with low chances of an objective consideration of a complaint by a living person. Heuristics also block instagram accounts, with almost zero chances of recovery.

And about emotions when communicating with a support or security service of a bank and their online client, there are legends in online forums. In my own skin I felt when they block access during a trip with two-factor authentication, and this is almost all the money available. Prior to that, I simply changed the SIM card from sim to micro sim with saving the phone number and operator.

How to defend your rights?

According to the experience of communicating with the customer service, the only advice to myself in the past is “Understand the nuances yourself, look for friends who can advise and rely on your own strength in the decision. Try to understand the motives of the parties to the conflict. ”And yet, if the problem can be solved by the least resistance: the one who has less rights and opportunities will lose. Those to whom you seek help will probably do so by eliminating your claims, simply hiding them as the main source of problems. You may be lucky in disputes if you have received a legal education and experience in its application. But the user agreement for the service (EULA) is designed in such a way that the intermediary cannot be its goal, although the veracity of the rating system of the participants depends on it.

To summarize, in the current state of online services there is no decentralized solution to check the reputation of participants, a system that can be trusted. So that part of your money and data is in the hands of the owners of these services and in case of problems, you are unlikely to be able to count on a prompt and constructive solution to the problems arising from their mediation. And from their point of view, you have only the right to pay them.