I booked accommodation 2+ months in advance in the Brittany region, and they canceled my reservation just 2 days before arriving. It was a real headache trying to find another accommodation, and of course it cost more. Is there any French tourist office where I can send a report to? I just want to let the appropriate authorities know about my experience, such that they can take actions if the hotel/hostel do this again to other people.

Who is "they". A hotel, a bed and Breakfast, a rental cottage -- what?

And why did they cancel? Did they go out of business, die, have a fire, or ????

You have given no detail at all . . . .

did they dsy why?

They're a B&B, and they said there was a problem with electricity in the rooms. The thing is that I booked one day (Saturday) in a long weekend (Friday was a holiday), so a french friend tried to talk with them to say they can not do that, and they hanged up. She told me that they probably turned me down to give my room to people who'd book for the full weekend.

name and shame!

They can be reported to the local DDCCRF (Direction Départementale de la Concurrence, de la Consommation et de la Répression des Fraudes), which is a very efficient watchdog for bad business practices.

Several B&B owners we've talked to said that bookings were down quite a bit this year because of the bad economy. If I were a B&B owner, I'de take any booking I could get - unless I had to turn away customers who wanted to book that Fri & Sat.

They could be telling the truth about the electricity....

Stu Dudley

Tourism is down 7% this year so far.

Back to Name and Shame. Posted here, they can loose business and we will write them about bad business practices. If they had "electricity problems", they should have helped you find another B&B Close by. Ardgarry B&B would have.

If the B&B is part of a network such as Gites de France, report the incident to Gites de France with backup information that you have presumably saved.

jkbritt - Is "name and shame" a figure of speech or a real forum where travellers can post. I have a hotel and a bus company who deserve a little shame and a lot less name.

Therefore, if there is a place to post for name and shame please share the info.

Better travels to all,
Julie

What I meant is that I would have written B&B XYZ in Town such and such canceled my reservation. I would have named them and given them the shame they deserve. After all, they can answer right here, too.

You can, of course, PROVE that this place cancelled the booking due to the "assumed" reasons, right?

Did you pay anything for this reservation? If no money has changed hands you could have done the same to them and lost them a longer booking.

Electricity can and does fail everywhere even big cities, would you have liked to stay somewhere by candlelight with possibly no hot water and very iffy coffee for breakfast.

If you want to name and shame them here it is a very select group and would have little impact. If you think it is something for the tourist board contact them as suggested above.

Why the assumption that the B&B is fobbing you off and the excuse is an excuse. It is of course quite possible that they did/do have electrical problems and were being buisnesslike in giving you advance warning. The onkly thing i could have faulted them for was not trying to find you alternative accommodation for the one night. I personally would be very unwilling to name and shame without first finding out if what you were told is correct. My personal feeling would have been "It's a nuisance and I need to find somewhere else, may be they can help" and not assume the business did not want your custom for the one night.
As Stu Dudley has written businesess cannot afford to turn business away and a one night stay is better than an empty room. I think yiu may be jumping to conclusions.

Hi Gvivanco,

I can definitely understand where you are coming from.

I think a possible remedy would be the following: go to tripadivsor.com and find the BB. They should be listed or you can list it for them. Give them a review. State the fact and let readers be the judge. Let readers understand that this BB has electrical problems and that one might face potential cancellation. In other words, their reservation is not 100% guaranteed.