Agoda.com daylight *******

I was doing an online query for availability at an establishment listed on Agoda. I had no intention of making a reservation as I was not travelling anywhere in that vicinity, since the hotel is nowhere near the Hat yai city Centre where I was travelling t, but I may have needed to spend a night or 2 there before departing to Indonesia later this month.

I clicked on check availability and the next minute I received a message saying the establishment is checking and will confirm….but then suddenly my card was charged!!

When I called the hotel to cancel, they very clearly told me that since the booking was through Agoda, they cannot refund, but will cancel my reservation on their system, however I will need to contact Agoda about a refund since the transaction was processed on their platform.

Agoda is attempting to make it seem as though the hotel will not refund, but Agoda has not yet paid the hotel as established by my call to the hotel immediately after the charge was made on my card. All my queries were done within minutes of the charge on my card, so there was no intent to have a reservation made!

AGODA now subsequently is "doing me a favour" by not charging me a cancelation fee and adding the amount as Agoda cash which I have 6 months to make use of!!

This is not the first time Agoda inadvertently messes up and refuses to rectify with a full refund! They're also notorious for keeping the full amount despite it not being lawful!!

We need to put an end to to this daylight *******!!