Pathetic Service

I would never use booking.com ever again! Their service is pathetic. On my first booking I chose St Lucia Palms and paid for the booking for 2 nights. I get a message saying my booking could not be confirmed and I have 30 minutes to respond. However, there are no return address/email or other manner to respond. They did however take payment for that booking. Because it was late at night I thought perhaps it's because of the late hour and didn't bother too much. Then again on the 16th January I found another place also in St Lucia for the same dates and decided to give it another try. I went through the same process of booking once again and po and behold! I get a message saying there seems to be an error and my booking could not be comfirmed. So once again they took my money but no booking. These 2 incidents occurred in less than 24 hours! Is this a legitimate business or a ****? Perhaps I I'll get my refund eventually but why does it have to take 7-12 days for a refund and why take payments BEFORE a booking is confirmed! Not I out of pocket for a few thousand Rands and hope I'll get my refund at some future date Absolute disgusted and will never use this service again