I booked a stay of 1 night on the 20th November for my wife and daughter to spend a day Christmas shopping in London. During the booking process the screen went blank for around 30 seconds and I thought that their system had crashed, however the screen came back and I entered my credit card details and booked the room. This was at around 10.20 in the evening on the 10th October - the following morning I was surprised to receive a voicemail left just before midnight from Beaufort House querying whether I would be arriving that day! I immediately called them and apparently their system had booked the accommodation for the night of the 10th November -the day I made the booking!

I telephoned and explained the problem but they informed me that they would be keeping my money (£309.61).

I sent an email explaining exactly what happened with their system and that there was no way I could have genuinely wanted a room for the same day - especially as the reservation was made at 10.20pm with a baby cot and arrival at 2.00pm!

They still refused to move the booking to the correct date and have kept my money whilst obviously incurring no cost.

I have now made an alternative booking with another hotel for our stay and I am trying to recover my money from the credit card company - who were surprised that their merchant had behaved in this way.

Beware...