When should hotels refund non-refundable rooms?

[souslechene]

When we started business 3 years ago (in France) we were quite innocent & often willing to accept bookings without a guarantee, just trusting people (nice dream!). We found out that many grand mothers died, kids went sick and cars went broken.
After the 1st year, we decided to be strict in asking a down payment upon confirmation of order. We are now saving many grand mothers' lives, kids sicknesses and car emmergencies. We are happy.
Very often, when there is some delay in paying the deposit, it ends up in cancellation after 2 or 3 weeks.
I initially was very upset when we had no show or late cancellation. I tried to have the balance payment sent to us & guests were trying to get back their deposit. It went no where. I have now decided to be very flexible and often refund the down payment : I assume that as long as guests went so far as to give a CC guarantee or issue a down payment, their decision to book was serious. It gives me happyness instead of anger. I hope they will come back another day. On my web site, in our booking terms, I have kept a strict cancellation policy to ensure they think twice before booking.

 

[egoodell]

When we started business 3 years ago (in France) we were quite innocent & often willing to accept bookings without a guarantee, just trusting people (nice dream!). We found out that many grand mothers died, kids went sick and cars went broken.
After the 1st year, we decided to be strict in asking a down payment upon confirmation of order. We are now saving many grand mothers' lives, kids sicknesses and car emmergencies. We are happy.
Very often, when there is some delay in paying the deposit, it ends up in cancellation after 2 or 3 weeks.
I initially was very upset when we had no show or late cancellation. I tried to have the balance payment sent to us & guests were trying to get back their deposit. It went no where. I have now decided to be very flexible and often refund the down payment : I assume that as long as guests went so far as to give a CC guarantee or issue a down payment, their decision to book was serious. It gives me happyness instead of anger. I hope they will come back another day. On my web site, in our booking terms, I have kept a strict cancellation policy to ensure they think twice before booking..

When we started business 3 years ago (in France) we were quite innocent & often willing to accept bookings without a guarantee, just trusting people (nice dream!). We found out that many grand mothers died, kids went sick and cars went broken.
After the 1st year, we decided to be strict in asking a down payment upon confirmation of order. We are now saving many grand mothers' lives, kids sicknesses and car emmergencies. We are happy.
Very often, when there is some delay in paying the deposit, it ends up in cancellation after 2 or 3 weeks.
I initially was very upset when we had no show or late cancellation. I tried to have the balance payment sent to us & guests were trying to get back their deposit. It went no where. I have now decided to be very flexible and often refund the down payment : I assume that as long as guests went so far as to give a CC guarantee or issue a down payment, their decision to book was serious. It gives me happyness instead of anger. I hope they will come back another day. On my web site, in our booking terms, I have kept a strict cancellation policy to ensure they think twice before booking.

My favorite was the call on the last day to cancel for a booking for major holiday weekend, that the grandmother "could go at any time" so they wanted to be able to cancel the day of check in without losing a deposit. When DH tried to suggest they change the booking date to sometime less stressful he got screamed at for being "rude". Fortunately they went ahead and cancelled so we could rebook the room. Put them on the Pita list. They were coming from a town 45 minutes away.
RIki