Beware of a new scam

[mnhtnbb]

which involves hotel reservations being hacked through the website Booking com

This afternoon I received an email from Booking com advising me of a message from one of the hotels I booked for a trip to Scotland I'm planning in October. The message from the hotel indicated it wanted to confirm a credit card by charging a small amount to the card which it would then reverse. I had never run into a hotel in that site doing such a thing, but it was on Booking.com's website. So I completed the form and a screen came back with an error message to call my credit card company. I did and talked to the fraud department. The charge had been denied, credited not to the hotel, but to a payment processing app called PAYZY, owned by a Greek bank. Talk about a red flag. I called the hotel in Scotland and only got voicemail. So I sent an email inquiring what time I could call and speak to Reservations about confirming the credit card. Then I sent the hotel another message via the messaging center on Booking.com.
About an hour later I had a response from hotel management indicating this was indeed a scam and they had reported it to the IT department of Booking com.
This was probably the most professional looking scam I have seen because the scammers had hacked into Booking.com to use their software to access reservations which asked for a credit card to be charged, and unless you called your card company or checked your credit card account online, you'd never see the charge against the strange app, rather than the name of the hotel.
I called my credit card company back to tell them the hotel confirmed the scam. The agent told me credit card companies are experiencing billions of dollars monthly in fraudulent charges.
Two days ago--on another credit card-- I got a text alert inquiring whether I'd authorized a $9. charge to some store in Missouri. I hadn't. That card is being replaced.
What a world.

[fujiyamasan]

1. Thanks for the head's up

Was the hotel an air bnb or something similar? Was it booked directly through booking.com or through this hotel’s site?

I’ve never seen this scam, but I’ll know to be skeptical if prompted to pay more fees after actually purchasing a reservation.

[mnhtnbb]

5. Out of the five hotels

I've booked through Booking com for this trip, this one is the most expensive.

[progree]

2. I'm going to stick my neck out and say that any business that says they need to verify a card via

making a small charge and then reversing it is a scam. I've never experienced that or heard that one. Legit businesses don't have to do that to verify a card, and anyway that maneuver would only verify that the card can handle whatever small charge, not the full amount.

[mnhtnbb]

6. That made me wonder, too

but I haven't traveled internationally since before COVID.
I get all kinds of scams regularly that go straight to my spam email. Very identifiable. As I said , though, this came through the messaging system of Booking com and when I accessed my account through their website--not a link-- the messages show up. It all looked very above board.

Got another set of the messages overnight -- even AFTER contacting Booking.com to advise them of the details of the scam.

[Grumpy Old Guy]

3. Scammers always charge a small amount first.

If it goes through they run it again for a large amount. It has happened to us several times.

[peacebuzzard]

4. Thanks for this. I will delete the Booking app.

and be very aware about reservations going forward.

[mainer]

7. Wow that is an impressive scam.

I can see how people might be taken in.
I usually book directly through the hotel’s website because you can get better rooms if the hotel doesn’t have to pay a third-party commission. If anything goes awry, you can fix It directly with the hotel. Booking.com, TripAdvisor, etc are good for doing searches, though.

[mnhtnbb]

10. I usually get better rates

Booking directly with hotels, too, and often only use booking.com to search, map, and compare prices of various hotels. This trip? Hardly any difference in price between hotel website and booking.com. So I opted to use booking.com in order to have all five hotels easily available in one place.

[DFW]

8. I just had to replace my US credit card, too

Some Pakistanis hacked into the KLM reimbursement system via two “companies” that operate in places like Nigeria, Kenya and India, calling themselves “Lemfi” and “World Remit.” They claimed to want to reimburse us, but immediately tried to debit the card instead. Upon checking, they are known for hacking into bank accounts and emptying them. Wonderful characters.

[The Madcap]

9. It's time to make scamming convictions a priority

And make the penalties extremely severe. At least life in prison.

I know it would be hard to do since so many of these are based outside the country and since we have the King of Grift as our infallible Leader, but somehow we have to try.