Travelodge and Watchdog

One thing that interested me last night was to catch BBC’s Watchdog programme, which featured Travelodge being shitepots. Nothing new there – but I didn’t know about this particular policy of Travelodge’s.

Turns out that despite offering a “guaranteed” room when you book with them, they have a policy of overbooking, so you could easily find yourself still without a room. They call this a “last man standing” policy – although it might as well be called a “last man sleeps in his car” policy. Of course, they can then say they’ve got a room at another Travelodge, but if you head off there (assuming that you can, have a car, and all that jazz) and someone else gets there before you, you can still not have a room.

And even better, because you can’t get a room at the original place, you don’t check in. Which means that the devious scumbags then get to charge you a full room rate for not turning up!

Now that is briliant. In a sleazy scumbag way, of course, but it’s still brilliant.