HotwireReviews 770

I booked a hotel in Ottawa through hotwire one week before my long weekend holiday, paid online and got confirmation letter from Hotwire. However the day when I tried to check in, the hotel said Hotwire did not book the hotel for me. Contacted the Hotwire customer service several times and asked them to find another hotel for my family and they could not, my family could not find other hotel either. After 3 hours waiting for their customer support response, we got nothing. My family (my wife and I and 2 little kids) had to sleep in the car along the street after 7 hours driving. The kids cried whole night and we almost did not sleep. The night was awful not only because we were exhausted, but also because of the bad customer service we received from Hotwire. My family long weekend trip was ruined by Hotwire and we did not have any mode to enjoy the long deserved vacation. Hotwire only refund my money back. The so called compensation is to give me 50% credit for next trip and must be used within one year. The bureaucratic customer service and bad company policy make me never use their service any more, basically the compensation means nothing to me. We will never use hotwire again. This appears to be an ongoing issue with this company and how they handle their customers. I am very disappointed in this company.

I made a 7-day car rental via Hotwire. When my plan changed, I called them immediately - before ever picking up the car - and canceled the reservation. The staff on the phone confirmed that it was canceled. I never picked up the car. Then, when my credit card monthly statement came in the mail, I noticed the full charge of $238.67 - for what? I called them again, but the staff denies that the reservation was canceled, because the rate I was quoted was a "special rate," which had locked in my reservation. That's not what the staff had told me the first time when I called to cancel. Hotwire knows what it's doing. They have developed a methodical scam, using cunning practices, to scam customers. I will NEVER use Hotwire again, but the company needs to be sued and voted out of existence. It's a matter of time that this will happen.

Once but never again. Booked through Hotwire hotel for my family in Olathe (KS). Hotwire sent me a confirmation. On arrival it seemed that the room was reserved. But a week later my creditcard was charged by the hotel for around $ 600, claiming they never received any money from Hotwire. Called Hotwire customer service but the lady (from India?) was not able to speak proper English let alone solve the problem. Now mailed Hotwire several times but never received an answer. So now I paid the room twice for $ 600. Hotwire never never never again. You can book your trip anywhere but take my advice: DO NOT USE HOTWIRE!

Just booked a 4* Hotel in NYC was given a list of 4 guaranteed hotels that I would get as my hotel. When I got the confirmation I ended up with a hotel that wasn't even on my list and Google is showing up as a 3* hotel. So basically they guarantee 1 out of 4 listed 4 * hotels and give you something totally different. The hotel they me only ended up 20 dollars cheaper than what I could have got Yotel for on booking.com. Fraudsters.

Book an all-inclusive trip with Hotwire only to find out that we have to pay $630 for my 13 year old to stay. Hotwire had messed up our order up. It was upsetting cuz Hotwire said we had to come up with the money or our child would have to be out for 7 days while we were in Mexico. We had all our information right when we booked our trip and when you are a regular person trying to take your kids on a vacation $630 is not easy to come up with even though they were going to pay back to us when we got back to the States. We had to scrape up every little penny so our 13 year old would not be out on the streets and try to figure it out. This totally ruined our vacation and all the little things that we wanted to do while we were there. We will not be using Hotwire anymore.

I wish I had read these reviews before booking with Hotwire!
I think that prior reviewers summed it up. I booked a hot rate hotel, got the hotel name and immediately researched for reviews. Bad and worse reviews. Since it is non refundable I had to spend almost 2 hours trying to correct the situation, as I was NOT staying at the hotel they "matched" me with. Bottom line, they agreed to rebook me but I had to pay for a new reservation and wait for a refund from the original booking. The final rate is only $5/ night less than the hotel's website and booking directly from hotel offers free cancellation up to 24 hrs prior to stay. This was a mistake I will not make again as I will never use Hotwire!
I am sharing this in hope that it will help other travelers.

Hotwire is the worse company I have ever used. I reserved a room online that stated I could pay at the property but just need a card to reserve room. This wasn't strange I have stayed several places with this policy. It also stated there is no cancelation fee. Less than 30 minutes after reserving the room I was made aware that I could not travel due to my daughter becoming ill. I immediately called the hotel they stated I had to call HOTWIRE to cancel the reservation due to my card not being charged. When I called hotwire the rude rep stated my card was charged and it is none refundable $86.00. I was told I would get a call back never happened then got an email stating oh sorry for the lost thanks for booking with us. Now calling nobody can explain anything. There was NEVER anything online stating this for the room especially saying I can pay at the property. Now I'm out of my money and no one is willing to help. Good thing when reserving the room I took a screenshot so now the bank is on it. This company is a scam and I will never in the life book anything with them.

Absolutely terrible from the start. Booked a flight to St Thomas from LAX a few months in advance, they changed our flight reservations about 5 times during that time with the last flight change making my arrival day 2 days past what we had originally booked. My friend and I were on different reservations so we each called to rectify the flights. After several hours of back and forth she was able to fix it, although getting entirely new flights. When I called to do the same, they told me it was against their policy to alter the reservation without a fee to me... When I stated my friend had just had this done just a few hours before they kept restating their 'policy'. The person I spoke to (after we ended the call) also went ahead and changed my flight to two days past he date I was calling to fix, which now had me landing 4 days past my original date. It took my friend and I about 8 hours of calling, dropped calls, and arguing for us to get my flight fixed. I will never never never never use Hotwire again and I will tell everyone I know never to use them either.

I finally resolved a rental car issue with Hotwire today and wanted to give a review so potential customers know what to expect. I've used Hotwire several times before. One thing I noticed is that the deals are not nearly as good as advertised (you'll see more at the end of the review). On some previous bookings, after I booked on Hotwire and learned about the name of the hotel, I went to the hotel's website and looked up the rates, and they were actually cheaper than Hotwire after taking the Hotwire fees into account. What prompted me to write this review is not the questionable deals, it's the customer service when something goes wrong. I booked a rental car for 2 days through Hotwire, and the rental car company said they were paid for only one day by Hotwire, so the rental car company made me pay for the second day of the rental. I contacted Hotwire by phone, by email many times, and even though Hotwire says the response time is 5 business days, I usually got no response after 5 business days and had to call them, and then they would tell me to wait for another 5 business days. Then at some point they told me to contact the rental car company directly, and when I called the rental car company, they said it had to go through Hotwire because I booked through them. After numerous emails and calls, I finally got a three-way call with Hotwire and the rental car company, and Hotwire agreed to refund me for the one day the rental company charged me for. Guess what, the rate the rental company charged me is $20 cheaper than Hotwire's rate. With such horrible service and bad deals, I would never use Hotwire again.

In large cities the lines are not drawn to logically separate neighborhoods. I mistakenly booked a hotel in Philadelphia thinking it was in the Rittenhouse Square area - it turned out to be 1 mile away from my target area. No refund of revision of reservation, I now have a reservation for a hotel I can't stay in AND I found the same and lower rates on my own for the same property! NO response from customer service to several emails and the rep on the phone was useless. Never using this service again.

I booked a hotel with hotwire and chose a 4 star rating for 3 families (3 per room). When we were given our hotel I called the hotel to check out accommodations... I was told that we have a single room and would be charged an extra $25 per family if the room needed a roll away bed. What? We were 3 people in a room Hotwire makes you choose your star rating... I chose 4 star! How does a roll away bed equate to a 4 star hotel? After me hearing this information I called Hotwire and YES I was confused/upset - We were going to New York with our son who is 17 and too big for a roll away bed or to sleep with mom and dad. Hotwire said that they will call to rebook elsewhere... I was on the phone for 3 hours... they could not find any other hotel... sounds fishy! Now they are going to call the hotel they booked me with and they said that they are going to confirm a double room (2 beds) in each room for my booking, now, I'm happy its 1:20 am and they are going to send me a confirmation. When I woke up I checked my email and there was no confirmation... I called hot wire again! I was on the phone for again approx. 3hrs. This is crazy! In the end they were crediting me $100 hotwire dollars to use on mt next booking and I'm getting a double bed room (2 beds) and the other 2 families might get roll away beds. I arrive in New York, I check in, I did not get a double room; the hotel does not have any left... I did get a room that equate to 2 stars and a roll away bed that I almost had to fight for in front of a crowd of people. In the end Hotwire said whatever they could to get me off the phone and for my persistence they credited me $100 Hotwire credit. This was all to their favour because they had me pay 4 star fees for a 2 star service. I'm one unhappy Hotwire customer