Hostelworld

he place is dirty, too hot, crowded and not enough toilet for the guest. The price is expensive for a shared room. The booking alterations was not flexible. I felt I was in a third world country and could not breath properly. I have to cut short my booking as the place was not safe for myself. Show details

Scam, avoid HOSTELWORLD, they will steal your money – Avoid this company, they steal your money. Avoid this company. They not just only do FALSE ADVERTISEMENT but also steal your money. The phone number in the website doesnt work, so its impossible to have a chat with them and if they decided to keep the money they will. I am in the process of suiting them. And also I have contacted 4 different… Read more

locations of the Burea of consumer protection. Do yourself a favour and stay away. Use booking.com. I never had a problem with them. The Hostel that I stayed in Seaside Hawaii its disgusting and old. Bathrooms gross. Terrible.

Booking Not Kept and Zero Accountability – I booked a hostel in central Melbourne 5 weeks in advance as I was travelling there for a major horseracing meeting and received my booking confirmation. When I arrived (heavily sedated after the flight) at the hostel at 3am in 7 degree temperatures, I was told by the hostel that a) I had no booking, b) they had no vacancies remaining and c)… Read more

everywhere else in Melbourne was booked solid for the same major race meeting that weekend. Even if there had been vacancies, I was unable to book one for that night because it was, unfortunately, after midnight and so the booking calendar would only let me book for the next night. I wasn't worried though, because Hostelworld offer 24/7 customer service, and I naively assumed they might actually fix this mess up.

First I tried calling their only listed number in Ireland, but was unable to be connected. I then sent off about 20 emails demanding they get in touch with me or the hostel by phone IMMEDIATELY as I was now in a desperate situation. They did not. Because it was too cold to stay outside, I had to contact a crisis charity to beg for a warm place to sleep. That's right: I was now technically homeless. So this charity paid a $79 cab fare to drive me out to Croydon and THEN paid for me to stay for two nights at the Motel which was literally the last bed in Melbourne. That's not cheap. That's also not the central business district I planned my holiday around. So now I was literally two hours from the City by public transport, meaning I got to the races late and was only just lucky enough to catch the last bus home when I left.

When I arrived home on Sunday evening, I found an email from Hostelworld saying "Thanks for contacting us! Unfortunately, I seems like the number you provided is not found. You can give us a call on this number: (same number in Ireland I clearly stated wasn't connecting). If you have any further questions please let us know!" They also replied to another of those 20 SOS requests with "I see that you have a booking today for XXXX. How can I assist you with this booking? If there is a problem with the booking please let me know & we can contact the Hostel for you" (which I'd clearly already done), so they knew about my predicament yet did absolutely nothing to fix the problem. When I got back home I spent another 10 days chasing them up before they responded with "Under these exceptional circumstances, I can refund your deposit, as the cancellation is due to circumstances out of your control.

I have now put through a full refund to your account as the property had issues with their system. Please allow 10 working days for this to be reflected on your account. The no-show fee is at the hostel's discretion. Please contact the hostel directly if you wish to query this charge." Just wow!!! I'm not sure why they're referring to a cancellation there. Or a no show. So I had a closer look at their terms and conditions and found this: "In the unlikely event that you encounter a problem on arrival at your property which you booked on www.hostelworld.com, whereby the property reception agent has no record of your reservation under your name or Hostelworld.com Reference Number or your confirmation email; we will credit your account on Hostelworld.com with the deposit amount you paid to secure the reservation. In addition we will credit your account by US$50 extra for the inconvenience caused, which can be used towards deposits of future hostel bookings on Hostelworld.com." So after all that drama they caused, they didn't even offer me the obligatory $50 USD. They turned a simple hostel booking into a huge drama that ruined my holiday and then showed zero accountability.