annhig; the hotel in Anuradhapura, Ceylan Lodge, booked through Agoda and charged a week prior to our arrival, claimed there was a problem with the electricity in our room only so they moved us to a hotel next door. That room was of a far less standard than I had already paid for. I asked for a refund or a discount. We settled on 2 dinners. But my belief is they overbooked and needed my room for a large group of Germans. I call that a scam.

I also thought the whale watching was a bit of a scam. The boat we used claimed you would get a 50% refund if no whales were spotted. We saw only one for 30 seconds. They were bound and determined not to have to refund the money. The way the whale watching is unregulated causes the boat operators to make false promises of seeing whales when they know all the boats chase them off.

the hotel in Anuradhapura, Ceylan Lodge, booked through Agoda and charged a week prior to our arrival, claimed there was a problem with the electricity in our room only so they moved us to a hotel next door. >>

that's a shame, susiesan.

I agree that what you describe sounds like a scam too, and that you probably got bounced because you were not part of a large group, and possibly because you had already paid.

We avoid Agoda because they take payment in advance; it's then so much more difficult to ensure you get what you want because they've already got your money! All the hotels we stayed at we paid the bill at the end, save for the 10% deposit we'd sent via our agent.

The whale watching doesn't sound good either. We were disappointed with the way in which elephants were chased around by loads of jeeps at the national park near Polonnaruwa and when we went to Yala insisted that we didn't want to do that, which they obviously felt was rather strange.

However I have read other accounts of whale watching in Sri lanka which were much better organised. sorry yours wasn't.