Just been scammed! hotelvalues.com

Harris27

Got scammed last week. A card I never use and it was in my purse all of the time. It was for a food outlet I never use.

What probably happened there was a thief with a scanner device walked past you and was able to mechanically grab the details off your card with their scanner.

One can do that with the cards of the type that one just flashes over the terminal and it seems most people use that type of card these days - rather than one that has to be inserted and one types in the pin.

It would be all very nice to have one I didn't have to type in a pin for - but when my bank sent me an updated card a bit back and I realised it was one of those "quick flashover" cards I just rang them straight up and said "You've sent me the wrong type of card - I use the other type. Are you going to cancel this card and send me a new one of my normal type - or am I swopping banks?".

They promptly said I wouldnt need to swop banks and a new card (of MY sort) would arrive within the week - and it did and so I stayed with my bank after all.

I've gone rather "belt and braces" too - as extra protection recently. Amazon has quite a range of those security card protector things on there and one keeps it with ones bank card if it's a pin-free type and anyone with a cloning machine nearby can't "get at it". Can't remember the generic name of these type of protective things - but I bought a make called "Blackout" and keep one of them in my purse with my cards.

Saves having to assess anyone/everyone near me to see if I can spot they're a thief (I've learnt one or two giveaway signs by now to help me see whether someone is normal or a thief) - but I don't want to have to be on guard all the time...

J52

Sorry this has happened to you, hopefully no money will be taken.
We never use third parties for booking hotels. It’s often cheaper to ring the hotel directly as all third parties charge the hotels to have them on their books.
Recently some friends have had an awful experience with Air B&B. The photos of the rental bore no resemblance to the filthy squalor that was reality. Of course they had to pay up front, so had to also pay for a hotel to stay in.

That's what I do when I require a hotel stay back in my home city - ie there's a hotel I've fixed on where they know me by now. That hotel is on the various websites - but I just ring them direct and make my booking with what I know is the person on reception there.

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Got scammed last week. A card I never use and it was in my purse all of the time. It was for a food outlet I never use.

BEWARE a rogue website "hotelvalues.com".

Hi all

I thought I had booked directly with a hotel we've stayed at before, in Scotland, but when I couldn't find a confirmation email I phoned them, and they said I did indeed have a booking, but it was via Booking.com. I phoned Booking.com with the reservation number which the hotel gave me, and they had no record of it.

I then found an email in my SPAM folder from "hotel values.com" of whom I have never heard, who had added over £100 to the room rate for two nights. Furthermore, the email was dated two days after I thought I made the booking, when I was away with my family and wasn't making bookings at all!

I immediately cancelled the booking and received an email confirming cancellation and that a refund would be on its way. [ha... I'm not holding my breath].

I contacted my credit card company who told me how to raise a dispute if the refund is not forthcoming.

I then googled "hotel values.com" and found a LOAD of complaints on REDDIT about it being a scam and people having their credit card details sold on the dark web after "booking" through the site, so I have contacted my credit card provider again and cancelled my card.

I had NO IDEA I was "booking" through this site... I had gone in through the hotel's own website, I thought.

SO BEWARE.. In future I will simply phone the hotels direct.

Same here! I am so mad. Unfortunately for me, I was charged and even though I cancelled the reservation. I learned the hard way.

Oh no, so sorry!
A friend asked on Facebook the other day "how many of you check websites before you buy anything?" I didn't reply because I was busy, but the truth is I am very wary. I know there are a lot of dodgy websites, often the products are in China. Sometimes they don't exist or will be manufactured cheaply when enough people buy the product.

It's always worth checking out if a website is secure (it will be https and a padlock), check the contact details to see it's got an English address, read their reviews, google it's email address, look at their social media channels- and finally even if you think it's ok, still use Paypal.

No one wants to give money to scammers.

Thanks LakesPop

Bit late to this thread but only just seen it.
I always like to book directly with the hotel I am staying with and find that they generally offer the lowest room rate and sometimes some nice extras like a drinks voucher or similar.
Over the years I have found a site which lists lots of UK based hotels with the best deals all for direct booking and I always use this now and have never had any issue.
They are really good for last minute deals and I have used their Warner Hotel links for these...
www.bestbookdirect.com/last-minute-warner-breaks.html

Thanks for this I've never heard of this scam. Like you it will also make me super cautious in the future.

petra

Thankfully a huge gang of scammers has been busted.
There business model was selling tech info to other scammers to enable them to setup false websites 😡

Good!

Coincidently, after my original post, the next day Sky News ran a story on 'holiday scams' about cloned hotel and flight web pages.

Today i went to look at flight costs to visit family and the official web page - Loganair - had a warning across the top of the page saying they were aware of fake pages online.

Thankfully it would appear that this time i acted quickly enough and no money went from our account.

Thank you all again for your kind messages, it's a minefield out there and as a frequent traveller, this incident has made me super cautious moving forward.

Thankfully a huge gang of scammers has been busted.
There business model was selling tech info to other scammers to enable them to setup false websites 😡

P Inns is that Premier Inns? There is an alarming discussion about them over on Mumsnet which has put me right off using them again.

Thanks for the warning - just shows how hyper-vigilant you need to be.
If we’re staying anywhere just for a night or two, we use P Inns, if there is one - and book via their own website. All fine so far, but 🤞.

Well done for spotting the scam and taking such quick action OP. I haven't booked a hotel since pre pandemic but I always phoned direct to make a reservation. Old fashioned I know but I think much safer. It also gave me chance to ask in person about their facilities. For example, there's a large, reputable hotel in my city that is still advertising a swimming pool on its website, even though this was closed 4 years ago. People who book online don't discover this until they arrive.

Sorry this has happened to you, hopefully no money will be taken.
We never use third parties for booking hotels. It’s often cheaper to ring the hotel directly as all third parties charge the hotels to have them on their books.
Recently some friends have had an awful experience with Air B&B. The photos of the rental bore no resemblance to the filthy squalor that was reality. Of course they had to pay up front, so had to also pay for a hotel to stay in.

We usually use Booking.com, however as i googled the pub by name to check it out, i fell for it.

Yes, Petra, i saw comments from all over the world, most people saying the same thing, they thought they were booking directly with the hotel/

I do now understand why people feel embarrassed at being scammed, it really makes you feel gullible/careless. Horrible feeling.

Thank you for your replies, much appreciated.

A quick search and I found this scam goes back to 2022. Comments from people all over the world.

There are so many hotel booking sites some dodgy most are genuine, it’s often difficult to get a discount rate direct with a hotel most just quote their full price.
Now we just use “Booking.com” which seems to be efficient, we have used “Airbnb” but accommodation is very variable and many require a deposit which is not easy to get refunded.

That's awful, however careful, so easy for these thieves, because that is what they are, to take other people's hard earned cash. Pleased to hear they failed this time.
May favourite, from "virgin media" , let the lady ramble on, wrong version of my name, wrong account , then I tell her she's a disgusting scammer, they hang up.

I am sorry that you got 'caught out', sickening feeling isnt it?
At least you became aware immediately and could do something about it and thank you for sharing and making others aware too.

These scammers will stop at nothing and seem to be finding all manner of ways to get their grubby hands on our money.

My OH's debit card was seemingly used in Burgas recently, we knew it had been cloned at some point despite NEVER being taken out of his bedside drawer since he received it. He did get all the money back though.