Wondering if anyone here has stayed at Mas du Loup, it's a RS recommended stay in his Provence guidebook for Moustiers-Sainte-Marie. We are planning a trip to the area for October and have had quite the booking experience, I'm wondering if this is typical for the business or I'm being scammed.
The owner, Julie, responded very quickly with a proposal, which was very acceptable. She asked for a deposit of €51 to hold the reservation and said she could only accept the deposit via wire transfer, and she included her bank information. I've never had this before, I've traveled quite a bit and stayed at a lot of B&B's and they usually ask for a credit card to secure it. But this is a RS recommendation, it's a small amount, and well-reviewed on all sites, so okay, I'll go along with it.
I contacted my bank and found it would cost $45 (almost as much as the deposit) to do a foreign wire transfer. So I emailed Julie back. Any chance you could accept the deposit using PayPal or another similar service? Sure! She says, send it through PayPayl So I did and received confirmation from PayPal. I sent her a copy of the confirmation and asked her to confirm receipt.
3 days later she emails me and tells me that she still hasn't received the deposit. Then she says she's had issues with that email address before (the same email address listed in the RS Provence guidebook and on the Mas du Loup website) and to try using a different email address. But the money has already been deducted from my personal checking account, plus the PayPal fee for the currency exchange. So I have no choice but to initiate a dispute with PayPal with a claim that she hasn't received the money and asking for a refund. PayPal says it will take up to 3 months to investigate the matter and get back to me with their decision. I have no intention of sending any additional money until this is resolved.
Has anyone else stayed here and experienced a similar issue? Or am I getting scammed? If so, I'm concerned that this is a RS recommended stay.