I never thought I’d get to this level of frustration with an online company, but I getting extremely close to activating my “legal benefits” package at work and suing Expedia.com for the on going debacle that was my vacation.

Updated: Happy ending to my story in that the credit hit my account on Friday – yay!

Me? Take legal action? Yeah, it’s nearly come to that.

I originally booked my 4 day trip to Vegas for the end of April. Due to personal reasons [that have been beat into the ground by now] I had to reschedule the trip at the “last” minute. Expedia surpassed my expectations with their service and flexibility: they re-booked my flight for no fare change and re-booked my hotel reservation at The Flamingo. There was the possibility of a charge from the hotel because there was less than 48 hours notice, but my agent at Expedia called the hotel staff: because of my situation they waived the charge. The package was paid for already so aside from the Expedia $30 fee for making changes, I was good to go.

Then I got to Vegas.

The Flamingo tells me “you had a reservation in April and it was cancelled”. This made me laugh. I mean I once had a reservation for a room in 2001 when I stayed at The Riviera – does that mean I expect that reservation to be usable in 2007? The “lost” reservation for July wouldn’t have been a problem except that The Flamingo tells me that they have no rooms. No rooms. 2500+ rooms are full. Riiiiight. I rallied against this and was polite until they told me “you can use the house phone to call one of our properties” and when I mentioned that I had paid for the room at The Flamingo already that I “would have to take that up with Expedia.”

After both comments, I stopped being polite.

Maybe they thought because I handed them a Washington driver’s license that I would be mild mannered and when confronted with injustice I’d go pass another law against online gambling or go hug a tree. Beware the New Yorker lurking in Washington Teva’s. I didn’t get mean mind you, but there was no way in hell I was going to call or search for room. Not when I made a reservation, paid for the lodging, and just got off the plane. Especially since The Flamingo has at least six sister properties they can view room availability for!

The hotel staff at The Flamingo then secured a room at Bally’s which was next door. Bally’s would hold the room while I talked to Expedia to work out the cash situation, especially because Bally’s 3-night fee would be $120 more than the original charge.

Over the next two hours I called Expedia three times – got disconnected twice on my cell phone after explaining the situation and waiting on hold for over 25 minutes while the agents tried to do something with the problem. The third call was placed on Bally’s front desk land line, which I was holding so tightly the sound was cutting in and out.

The time for being polite had passed.

When I finally got through to the third agent I had gotten tired of trying to get Expedia to find me a new room at the same price – I told them to refund me the hotel part of the package and I would pay for the new room at Bally’s on my own. Agent says “I can do that but you’ll have to call back tomorrow to make sure it goes through.” I raise an eyebrow and say “OK” – the next morning I call at 9:01am to validate all of this. After all, I’m spending an extra $140 on the hotel room that I didn’t plan to – I didn’t want to pay for two hotel rooms, one of which I didn’t even get to see. Expedia agent tells me everything is fine. [this is important since this call was on July 1st]

Oh, and since Bally’s had no regular rooms available, they gave me a suite for one night at the standard rate which is exactly what The Flamingo should have done in the first place.

Anyway, I enjoyed the time in Vegas immensely and didn’t think much about the whole Expedia experience until I got home. I then noticed that there was no “coupon” in my account. The longer my phone calls with Expedia went on that first night, the bigger the coupon they promised. Would it matter to me? I mean, will I trust Expedia again in the future for vacation? Maybe. But even if I didn’t, I certainly would consider them for airfare. They did get that part right and that’s the easiest part to verify on my own.

But the point was they screwed up again: they promised me a coupon – I wanted my coupon even if I was going to print it out and wipe my ass with it. So I call again, wait 10 minutes on hold and then they put the coupon on my account. Yay.

So why the legal action? This is where it gets ugly.

Two weeks after I get back from Vegas my credit card bill comes in. I review my charge history faithfully every month. Sadist? No, I’m looking for unauthorized charges… back in the day that happened to me once – it was a charge to AOL that tipped me off. Stood out like a glowing beacon. But in seeing that I noticed some other charges I never made. Now I look. Every month.

No refund from Expedia. Check the pre-statement activity for the next month: no refund from Expedia.

I called them on Jul-19, annoyed. And in this instance, rather justifiably annoyed. After 15 minutes on hold I hear “YessirYessirYessir, we’ll process it right now.” Alright, fine. “Oh, and just so you’re aware, it will take 7-10 days for the credit to appear on your statement.” Er, OK, sure. I’ll wait. Wrote down the reference number this time. And the dates and times that I called. Even the phone number cause it’s so damned painful to figure out how to type “letters” on my QWERTY cell keypad.

I checked every day. No credit.

I look today: my unbilled activity for the month shifted and now I have a new balance. No credit on either statement.

Oh. My. God.

So I call Expedia again this morning. After 30 minutes on hold I was such a happy person just to get rid of the elevator music they pipe through their system. Agent: “Uh, it looks like we never processed the credit… um.” Me: ‘What. T3h. HELL. Isgoingonhere.?!’ [chaos ensues] The agent promises me that she’ll put it through the refund department today. And yes, I asked her “Why should I believe y’all this time?” She rebounded nicely, actually, explaining where they system broke down before… even dropped yet-another-coupon in my account.

At least she said she would – it still hasn’t turned up there.

Oh and it’s another 7-10 days for this refund to go through, so I get to play “watch the account balance” again for a week.

*sigh*

The thing that truly worries me is that when I said “if it doesn’t go through this time, I’ll have to call the credit card company, declare the charge as fruadulent and take legal action against Expedia – why should I have to carry the interest for a charge that supposed to have been refunded a month ago?!” she replied, “I would totally agree since it has been so long – if you don’t see the credit posted by the end of next week, you should do what you have to.”

Hearing that makes my feet itch: this happens must happen to them all the time and now I have to question the odds of me getting my cash back…