In a much-awaited response to the growing concerns of self-catering property owners, Booking.com has released an official statement addressing payment issues and providing clarity on the matter. As the self-catering industry continues to face economic challenges, property owners have been vocal about the need for transparent and reliable payment processes. Booking.com, a leading platform for accommodation worldwide, has acknowledged these concerns and is taking steps to reassure its partners.
Below we share a copy the statement sent to the ASSC from Booking.com, which outlines the company’s commitment to addressing these concerns and enhancing the financial security of self-catering property owners. This statement sheds light on the steps and initiatives that Booking.com is implementing to support owners during this time:
“As part of our investment to ensure our technology continues to deliver ever higher levels of online safety and security for our business partners, their guests and our systems, we needed to carry out essential improvements, including system upgrades to our financial and payment platforms. Despite having planned carefully and notified our partners in advance that we would be carrying out this work, a number of unforeseen problems occurred. This meant that payments to some of our partners were disrupted.
We know that for some of the partners who were affected, this had an impact on their businesses, and on their professional and personal lives. For this, we are deeply sorry.
The delays in receiving payment that some of our partners experienced were longer than we anticipated. This is not the level of service we would ever want to deliver to our partners. We know that we have fallen short of the experience partners expect from us and we recognize that we have work to do to win back their trust.
We fully understand that an apology doesn’t change the impact we have had on their business. We are providing compensation to those partners whose payment was delayed by 21 days or more after the pre-announced temporary suspension of payments related to our financial systems upgrade. The exact amount of compensation is determined by the amount owed and the length of delay experienced. This compensation will be in the form of a one-time cash payment, which will be deposited directly into the partner’s bank account by the end of November.
The vast majority of payouts have resumed and are being processed as per usual, since ensuring our partners are paid on time is a top priority for us. We have heard the feedback from our partners and are learning from it so we can do better in the future. Our CEO has given his personal commitment to partners to ensure we deliver better levels of service in the future.”