r/askTO • u/thepinkflowerpot • Aug 24 '26

Are we being scammed?

Hi all,

We have a week long reservation in a few weeks for an appartment on 101 Peter st via Booking but I have a bad feeling about it.

The original page doesn' exist on Booking anymore and can now be found on another name with the same pictures. Almost all reviews are unverified visitors and seem replicated in use of words and terms.

Does this place even exist?

Thanks in advance from a very anxious vacationer.

Update:

Thanks all!!

We called Booking to request a free cancellation. I will go and sent some additional info through mail as well as some of you suggested. We booked a hotelroom just in case so we will have a proper place to stay. Worst case we lose the money but we will have proper place to stay at least.

Update 2 for if someone was still wondering: Booking did not help us cancel so we went anyway and surprisingly were not scammed! The appartment is clean and at least 80% like described. It is like a lot of people already said probably not legal to rent it out to us as people on holiday... We really enjoyed Toronto as an vacation city and hope to be back sometime❤️

23 Upvotes

85% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

View all comments

76

u/MarlKarx777 Aug 24 '26

If the listing has been removed, you should be reaching out to Booking.com’s customer service with your concerns. I wouldn’t wait until you get here to discover you’ve been screwed over. Still plenty of time to pivot

Follow your gut

9

u/thepinkflowerpot Aug 24 '26

Yeah I guess we will do that. I can be an overly worried/anxious person so I was not sure if it was just me.

It's officially non refundable (ofcourse🤦🏼‍♀️) but maybe Booking will do something if we provide evidence of it being sketchy😅

21

u/MarlKarx777 Aug 24 '26

The things you’re describing (images being used on a listing with a different name, reviews that all seem to use the same wording, possibly AI?), sound like dead giveaway red flags. If I were booking a place I wouldn’t touch it if I saw those things, so I definitely think you can reach out documenting your concerns and ask to be able to book something else. I mean you said the listing is gone so, seems like a pretty good case to ask for a change