VRBO VRBO fails to honor cancellation and refund policy. Owner ignores emails and phone calls. Austin Texas
I reserved and paid the required deposit of $2170.50 for this property on October 13th and cancelled the reservation on October 14th after finding a more suitable location. The refund policy on the property at the time of my reservation states "bookings cancelled at least 14 days before the start of the stay will receive a 100% refund." My cancellation notice and request for a refund of my deposit was thus sent more than 60 before the start of the stay and qualifies for the "100%" refund of my payment.
I cancelled this reservation by sending an email directly to the owner and by sending a cancellation request through the VRBO website. I received a copy of an email from VRBO to the owner which notified him of my cancellation. This email is dated 10/14/17. After receiving no response to either of my emails or VRBO's own email to this owner I called the phone number listed on VRBO for the property owner and left a message on 10/15/17 requesting that he respond to both my and VRBO's requests for a refund. With no answer to all these attempts to contact the owner I called the help number at VRBO on 10/16/17 and explained the situation and requested help from VRBO in obtaining my refund.
The VRBO representative was cordial and professional but could only offer to attempt to contact the owner directly and ask him to honor his cancellation and refund policy. On 10/18/2017 I received a response from VRBO that asked me to "contact the owner directly"which I of course had already attempted to do repeatedly while also stating that if I did not receive a refund from the owner to "please contact the payment provider you used for payment to inquire about options for the return of your funds".
On 10/18/2017 I contacted my credit card company and disputed the charge from VRBO but unfortunately my bank had to tell me that VRBO could refuse to grant the refund and if they do refuse to honor the refund I will be contacted by my bank. Furthermore, after learning of my plan to file a tort claim for fraud and theft by misrepresentation, VRBO has now informed me that they were not the "merchant of record" for the credit card transaction even thought the charge was recorded as coming from HomeAway, the parent corporation for VRBO. Apparently VRBO will claim that they are "just a marketplace" and not the merchant thus attempting to deny any responsibility for this type of fraud.
Do NOT make any reservations through VRBO, HomeAway or any associated web services. You will be left entirely on your own in the event of fraud, misrepresentation or theft by the owner of the property who is protected by VRBO. You will not be able to obtain the identity or location of the owner who received your funds through the VRBO or other websites. The owner will be able to indefinitely and repeatedly refuse your refund request despite its falling within the cancellation and refund policy that was stated on the rental description from VRBO originally. VRBO will claim that they are not a party to this fraud even though they operate the website and the credit card payment application used by unscrupulous owners to receive and keep money through fraud.