nonrefundable deposits

Hi Jules M, I’ve been making reservations this past week for several cities in Italy for next May. I haven’t seen any requiring 30% non refundable. I have seen non-refundable choices, and I don’t book those. Or, more often, the option to pay a little more for a refundable reservation which I choose.

Sometimes when it gets closer to the date, I will switch to a nonrefundable, or I will pick one nonrefundable per trip if it’s something obscure or special that I specifically need for a location.

I will add, maybe it’s the locations where I am heading. These are all in the Puglia region, Caserta & Rome. Other than the Rome airport hotel, they are all small hotels/B&B’s.

Thanks, Jean. I'm having difficulty finding places open in Puglia when we are visiting January/February. I ran into a couple nonrefundable deposits for Trullo, but I did find a place in Alberbello. A place I'd like to stay in Monopoli, recommended by a few on the forum, Albergo Diffuso, wants the 30% deposit.

There was a place in the Dolomites, in Castelrotto, this past September, that wanted a nonrefundable deposit for a 5 day stay, I found something else.

More common in my experience has been a non-ref deposit on a vacation rental, not a hotel room. I do use Booking.com a lot for hotels because so many have a choice to pay a little ore and still be able to chancel up to a day or two or three in advance. We are staying in Rome now and I made a reservation directly with the hotel which allowed cancellation up to 72 hours before arrival and pay on site after our stay.

Everyone is looking for ways to make a buck. Is the rate better with the 30% no refundable deposit rate? Do they give you other options for higher rate but cancellation options?

Is the Italian hospitality industry banking on the even higher than the normal high influx of tourists due to the Jubliee in 2025?

For the Monopoli hotel, the rate choices are nonrefundable or 30% nonrefundable deposit. If I look at the same hotel on booking.com, the rates are higher and choices are nonrefundable or refundable up to 72hours (a fair amount more expensive)

That makes sense. They can afford to offer lower rates when they get 30% of the payment far in advance with no risk. You have decide what your appetite for risk is. You could potentially save quite a bit but there’s a chance of also losing money…

What difference is there between that and the cost of the first night when you cancel with short notice? It has been fairly standard for first night lost. Generally the nonrefundable with deposit are the cheapest rates. It is called insurance and you are paying for it. If you don't like the terms, move to the next offering.

"Everyone is looking for ways to make a buck." That is an unfair cheap shot. Implies greed. Sure, everyone wants to make a dollar but many of the hotels are small with limited number of rooms. If someone bails out the day before, the hotel may have limited options to fill that spot. Two or three vacant rooms in a small hotel may be a substantial financial problem.

Just to be clear, I'm not talking about bailing the day before. I'm just not happy putting down a nonrefundable 30% of a long stay, 3-4 months in advance.

And, obviously, I do know, it is my choice, and I have moved on to something else when I've seen those terms.

When I was booking for the Dolomites, I noted that some of the hotels/inns with nonrefundable deposits were selling cancellation insurance. Just for entertainment, I looked at it. Wow, given my probability of cancellation, I would have been better to take the risk of losing the deposit. For any wanting to insure a hotel deposit, at that point, it seemed more economical to purchase regular trip insurance.

My point, is this something relatively new, or could it be a result of COVID cancellations.

Not in Italy necessarily but we've noticed some more stringent refund policies here in the States lately. For instance, one of the accommodations we booked in Vermont required a 50% deposit at time of booking. All but $25 of it was refunded if you cancelled over 14 days in advance; within 14 days you lose the deposit; within 48 hours you are charged the full amount of the reservation. As it was a 4-night stay during high season, that deposit was considerable so we were crossing fingers that illness or injury didn't cause us to have to cancel within that 2-week period.

They were a small, family-run property so I could see where being stuck unexpectedly with open rooms during (what was likely) their most profitable season would have been a big hit to their bottom line.

Seems like we see sometimes where people have reserved rooms at multiple properties in the same cities with the intention of cancelling all but one of them when they make up their minds which one they want? I wonder if there's a lot of that going on that's adding to tightening of refundable policies?

My point, is this something relatively new, or could it be a result of COVID cancellations.

Is more due to the online booking (increased a lot in the last few years). A lot more people book two or more places and keep them blocked until the last moment. So hotels are adding policies to reduce this risk.
Of course: more freedom you give to the tourists (free cancelation until last moment, changes of dates and so on) more the tourists are attracted. On the other side the risk to have the rooms blocked and then canceled two days before losing money (maybe in high season) is too much now.
There is even the risk that some rooms are blocked by competitors and then canceled.

Final result, as often happens, for the unfair behavior of few people everybody is paying.

A big hotel with hundreds of rooms can risk a free cancelation policy, but a nice charming hotel who maybe have 10 rooms (or a trullo, who has one room) cannot risk to lose an high percentage of the income.

I have found non refundable deposits or even the entire payment to be a problem in the Dolomites. It is hard to find something that doesn’t have such requirements.

Otherwise, I haven't found it difficult to eliminate such places and still have reasonable choices.

Ricky, excellent point.

You are right, the hotels need to protect their income, especially from those that double book. I never book more than one hotel for a specific time period. I dislike have to commit with a nonrefundable deposit before I've booked all my hotels and finished any tweaking of itineraries.

And since I tend to only book small, independent properties, I will probably see this more than those that book larger properties.

I think if I get to the point where I need to book the ones with the penalties, I ask if they will hold for a week before taking a nonrefundable deposit. I'd probably happy to pay a deposit if it could be cancelled with refund within a week. Maybe that will fly, maybe not.

Okay, that covid thing was all a bit odd, but in general aren't the reasons you might cancel a booking (illness, bereavement, travel disruption, etc), the same reasons you could claim the unrefundable deposit back on your travel insurance? That's certainly what I've had to do.

Nick, as I said above, we don't use trip insurance. It doesn't make any financial sense for us. We have health insurance coverage in Europe as well as evacuation that is as good or better than any trip insurance.

I have probably cancelled a hotel reservation under five times in all my travels, and never within a week of the stay. Each time its been related to an itinerary conflict or change.

I've researched trip insurance fairly extensively and did purchase it for the two cruises we did. Insurance tends to be bundled with coverages we don't need. Now, if the nonrefundable deposits become more prevalent, perhaps I'll look again. I'll also need to reevaluate when my husband moves to Medicare coverage.

Nick makes a great point about insurance. We have great health insurance but want the extra protection for potential medical evacuation and found an annual policy is pretty reasonable and still covers some of the reasons for cancellations: illness or death of one of the travelers for example. I still don’t like to do non-ref too far in advance, but to NIck’s other excellent point, the smaller properties and independent owners need to protect themselves as well.

We still travel with no reservations other than first and last night and have done so for 40+ years but am getting concerned about future travel. So far have not had to sleep in the train station. Use to make heavy use of the TAs and still do sometimes but mostly hotel.com and hoteltonight.com one to two days in advance. And we are pretty flexible so it works for us.

Update: I actually contacted the inn I really wanted to stay at (in Apulia, Monopoli). Told them I wanted to book, but preferred to wait 2 weeks before making the nonrefundable deposit. Told them I wanted to wait until I had a final itinerary, and they were amiable.

I just booked another place, in Lecce, they want no deposit, no CC information, nothing except that if I cancel, give a 72 hour notice.

Like previous trips, I'm amused that some places want cc, nonrefundable deposit and my favorite child while others do not want anything other than my name.

I did notice that this summer in Venice and in Ortisei. I had a firm itinerary, so in Venice I went ahead and paid non-refundable for 2 nights. I think in Ortisei, I paid first night (of 4). I do have trip insurance in case our whole trip were cancelled. I chalked it up to supply and demand - too many people making plans and not enough lodging to accommodate travelers changing their minds. In Bellagio, the apartment just wanted my name. Who knows.