Hey, I was wanting to book a hotel through this site but after reading some dodgy reviews based on this site, I am now unsure. I have called up hotels that this site claim they deal with and the hotels have not heard of the company, was just wondering what you thought?

I used www.hotel-board.com several times.

1. For the firt time (it was in 2008) I booked a hotel in Vienna, Austria. The price was the best one and my booking was done excellent. No problem at all.

2. For the next time I booked 3 hotels in Italy in October 2009. According to their terms and conditions I used my credit card and made prepayments (100% from the total price for staying in the hotels: 13 days in Rome (from 13.11.2009 till 24.11.2009 and from 29.11.2009 till 30.11.2009) and 5 days in Florence (from 24.11.2009 till 29.11.2009)). The money was taken from the account immediately and I got 3 vouchers with all the details. After some days I wrote letters to the hotels asking them to confirm my reservations. All hotels confirmed all of my reservations. Unfortunately, my plans had changed and I had to cancel all my bookings on 29.10.2009. Due to terms and conditions of booking system www.hotel-board.com: «You can cancel your booking 7 (seven) business days prior your check-in to the hotel. All you need to do is visit "My Booking" section and request a cancellation. Cancellation requests received after the Hotel Voucher has been issued will incur a minimum charge of 20EUR or 35USD plus 2.5% bank charges. Please note that you may face partial or full penalties plus 2.5% bank charges if you would like to cancel your booking within the last 7 days. Bookings within the area of special events, fairs, peak seasons should be cancelled before 21 days of check-in date in order to avoid No Show penalities (up to 100% of payment). There will be no refunds for late check-in or early check-out» (С) is taken from the web-site www.hotel-board.com. After lots of my letters www.hotel-board.com returned to me the money for 2 of 3 bookings (about 500 euros) and I have nothing against them. BUT… The payment for the longest staying in Rome (about 1200 euros) hasn’t been returned yet. I have written about 20 letters to them and everytime they have sent to me different answers like this: “Your refund has been processed and will be in your account very soon” (30.11.2009), «Please, check your account in two-three days” (30.11.2009), «I have sent the information to our accounts and will revert back to you as soon as possible (29.12.2009), “I have instructed our accounts to investigate with our merchant bank and we will revert back to you as soon as possible” (12.01.2010). So today is 08.02.2010 and I still have no money on my account. As they break their terms and conditions rudely i can think that my money has been stolen by them and I will never see it on my account. So I want to say to everyone that if you want to cancel your booking which was made with www.hotel-board.com means that it is very possible that you will not see your money back. So, be careful!!!

3. In October 2009 I also booked a hotel in Istanbul. I chose Erboy hotel for staying from 31.12.2009 till 06.01.2010. Once again the price was very good and I bought a room making prepayments (on that moment I didn’t know that I will have any problems with hotel-board). I got a voucher with all the details. In December 2009 I wrote a letter to Erboy hotel and asked them to confirm my reservation. A manager told me that he knew nothing about my visit and about me. I wrote a letter to www.hotel-board.com about this situation and they told me that maybe the hotel had no information about me for that day. Later I wrote to Erboy hotel once again and sent them my voucher which was given by www.hotel-board.com. Once again Erboy hotel told me that they didn’t have any information about my visit and they didn’t work with such company as www.hotel-board.com (DJE Hotels Ltd.), they are working with TRAVCO. In my voucher I saw that the voucher itself was given by the www.hotel-board.com but the booking was made by TRAVCO (and there was TRAVCO’s reservation number). As the manager of Erboy hotel wrote me that TRAVCO was an intermediary between the www.hotel-board.com and Erboy hotel. So as I see www.hotel-board.com didn’t book a room for me in Erboy hotel directly. The manager of Erboy hotel checked the TRAVCO’s reservation number and told me that I had a reservation in another hotel in the same hotel group (Sirkegi group) – in Ilkay hotel which was a bit cheaper than Erboy hotel. I wrote about it to www.hotel-board.com and they told me that there was a mistake and I should take my voucher and go to Erboy hotel. I wrote a letter to TRAVCO and they told me that www.hotel-board.com had booked a room in Ilkay hotel for me not in Erboy hotel. I told TRAVCO: “As I paid for Erboy hotel I want to live in Erboy hotel”. There were no answer to me. As I was very short of time I took my voucher and went to Istanbul to Erboy hotel as it was written in my voucher and as it was told by www.hotel-board.com. In Erboy hotel the manager told me that they had no reservation for me in Erboy hotel and my reservation in Ilkay had been cancelled by TRAVCO on 29.12.2009 because www.hotel-board.com hadn’t paid for my booking at all. So because of the actions of hotel-board I stayed in Istanbul on 31.12.2009 without any room in any hotel and had to buy a room for the 100 euros per night. On 02.01.2010 on the page of my booking in the web-site www.hotel-board.com I saw a message that my booking was cancelled by me and TRAVCO. Due to terms and conditions of www.hotel-board.com the only the client can cancel the booking by himself in the web-site. I didn’t cancel my booking with the web-site. I called to www.hotel-board.com for 4 days and asked them to call me back and solve this problem – paid to the hotel directly or to TRAVCO for the booking. They didn’t call me back and didn’t pay. In 4 days the managers of Ilkay hotel wrote a letter to www.hotel-board.com and www.hotel-board.com wrote to them that they had already returned all the money on my account. They lied – I haven’t had my money yet on my account.

I want to say thanks a lot to TRAVCO who didn’t work with clients directly that they started to solve my problems (called and wrote letters to Erboy hotel) because www.hotel-board.com hadn’t done anything for that despite the fact that I had paid to www.hotel-board.com directly.

So I want to pay your attention that in all cases I made 100% prepayments (paid more than 1200 euros and 300 euros beforehand). And I paid that money before 2 and 4 months before my comings to the hotels. And as it was my money I guess I can cancel my bookings and get my money back according to the terms and conditions of www.hotel-board.com with the deduction of existing fees and commissions.