Booking.com ********* business

I have intentionally tried to focus on the positives on social media however I feel obligated to share this and warn countless others who may fall victim to Booking.com and their conniving, ********** ways. While our vacation in USA brought the most unbelievable memories it didn’t come without stress. Many hours, days and costs of our supposedly relaxing family time (and many years saving) spent trying rectify the horrific experience and outright (multiple) stuff up by Booking.com and whoever they try to pass blame to. Two days before we were due to arrive in Miami Booking.com cancelled our accommodation reservation. Had the tables been turned and we canceled we would stand to lose 100% booking fee may I add...but no charge or compensation for them canceling on us last minute!! We were left scrambling to find another place and fortunately found something great, albeit pricier due to late booking. Booking.com then suddenly came back to us saying the original place is available again but we made it clear in writing (three times in fact) that we no longer want anything to do with that booking. When they refunded the initial booking cost I lost over a R1000 because of the exchange rate at the time after THEIR failure to honor their commitment! But I, perhaps stupidly, let this loss of income slide and just wanted to be done with them as they had ****** us of enough vacation time and tranquillity. UNFORTUNATELY a few days later we see that Booking.com went ahead and deducted the full amount anyway for the original accommodation (and then some...as they deducted, without authorization, over $2000...a much higher rate and included all taxes and housekeeping charges!). What a crazy battle to get the full refund...endless phone calls at our expense...emails, valuable vacation time etc. yet AGAIN! And of course all they can do is reply with the same stock standard answer to apologize but say unfortunately it will take 8 days to refund!!! 8 DAYS to recover THEIR mistake...Let’s imagine that that money was all our vacation funds and we had no alternative!? Would we have to sleep on the street with our child waiting for them to refund our vacation finances??!! They offered no alternative not even any nights accommodation to compensate for their blatant stuff up. Wait it gets better... We continue our stay and fortunately found gem accommodation. Fast forward three weeks and we’re now in Italy...only to have almost R15000 deducted without authorization, yet AGAIN by Booking.com!! So alas the battle continues and now yet again we’re in the same predicament. Since we’re traveling for a long period canceling my card has a detrimental knock on effect and quite frankly I’ve always been ultra cautious using it only with so called reputable businesses. At what point does Booking.com step up and own this in its entirety???!!! Since none of their gazillion global call center staff/supervisors are empowered to properly handle this customer f@&$ up I emailed their CEO Gillian Tans who has yet to respond as I’m sure she’s too busy strategizing instead of serving or properly empowering her teams to serve! I hope their ‘strategizing’ seriously looks at their customer experience and system alignment?! It is the very essence of this complete lack of genuine concern for customers and inability to properly recover from a bad customer experience that has me wonder how these ‘large ‘wealthy’ well known brands’ continue to function. So while they continue to strategize and de***** their customers I warn you ALL to stay away from them and I patiently watch ‘how the mighty falls’! No brand is too big to fall and when you can’t look after your loyal customers I’m afraid you tarnish your reputation for life...one customer at a time (that’s all it takes for word to get out there). Booking.com I hope you find some level of competence to act fast and save what’s left of your pathetic undeserving paycheck!!