4 ms·

Curious how they need a 10 day outage on the outbound payment side, but not the inbound payment side which must be significantly more complex!

berbec 3y ago
This is some new definition of the word "need" that I am unaware of. Methinks a liquidity problem is the true culprit.
- spyke112 3y ago
  To be fair, payment in is probably handled completely differently through a payment service provider as card payment, where as payment out probably is bank transfers, which I would imagine is not as easy.
- mschuster91 3y ago
  Unless they've been doing shit like paying for promotion discounts in a "snowball" pyramid scheme - which I don't believe - they should not have a liquidity problem, quite the contrary, as people pay weeks to months in advance. The interesting thing is... what's with the hosts who get into financial difficulties after 10 days of delayed payments. I get it that three years of a pandemic, the consequences of the Ruzzian war, and inflation have been a drain on everyone's reserves - but not even ten days of runway? Holy shit.
  - fphhotchips 3y ago
    It's not 10 days; it's (up to) almost a month: > payments for guests checking out from June 28 would be delayed and all paid out in one go on July 24. That said, it sounds like payments are normally delayed by 10 days from checkout. Of course, apparently some payments "could be delayed until August", so all I can say with authority is that this is a mess.
    - mschuster91 3y ago
      Okay now that is an entirely different amount of mess (and completely unacceptable), still troubling to see businesses having such a low amount of runway. I mean, anything could drive them into disaster at that point, even an unrelated natural disaster cutting off the roads to the village or whatever.
      - KidJhb 3y ago
        Came across this thread as I am owed well over 60 bed nights by BdotC. Say what you like about lack of runway, bear in mind that I bore all the costs for this accommodation upfront, some of it since May. Everything. If I had let those rooms out on another platform I would have been paid on check-in. Why are they robbing the little guys, what is going on with their cash flow? A switchover can happen overnight, with the right planning, there should be no need to delay payments by 3 months!
- zippercreatemy 3y ago
  100% has to be a liquidity issue. I am guessing that they invest the funds in trust in overnight markets and someone has had too many losses.
  - sally1984 3y ago
    They are sponsoring FIFA women's football world cup 2023. Definitely, not bankruptcy or liquidity issue.
  - jsumrall 3y ago
    That would be quite the story, as I have the impression that Booking is absurdly profitable.
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      That's what they said about Van Moof, and plenty of other companies that ultimately went bankrupt. They had a pretty bad loss two quarters ago: "Net income was $266 million, compared with a net loss of $700 million in the prior-year quarter" https://s201.q4cdn.com/865305287/files/doc_financials/2023/q1/Q1-2023-BKNG-Earnings-Release.pdf https://s201.q4cdn.com/865305287/files/doc_financials/2023/q...
      - sally1984 3y ago
        payments to hosts over IT techni... Please visit this group in FB which was created to register all the concerns from hosts and guests from all over the world. We can collectively work together to fix this situation. https://m.facebook.com/groups/1316864141779135/ https://m.facebook.com/groups/1316864141779135/
  - wewilldieanyway 3y ago
    Hahah, I wish. Booking stock is at an all-time-high at the moment, and we could have made very good money if they indeed had a liquidity problem. Poor tech + poor timing. Take off the tinfoil hats.
- arp242 3y ago
  While I lack direct first-person experience, I've heard some pretty harrowing tales about the state of booking.com's backend over the years from multiple independent sources, which makes me think that "technical reasons" is at least plausible. Also, from a quick search, Booking seems to be doing fine financially.
- delfinom 3y ago
  If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck
- mrweasel 3y ago
  Seems more or at least equally realistic that someone screwed up and now Booking.com won't admit that they are scrambling to fix something on the backend.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    Scrambling implies something quick. This has been going on for too long to use that term.
siva7 3y ago
They're setting their priorities straight.
that_guy_iain 3y ago
They don't lose money if they slow down their payouts but they do lose money if they stop accepting money. Basically, they can just down outbound payments for 10 days and not really lose any business. For most places it's probably not going to be that much of a problem they need to wait 10 days for a payment. If you can do something and it makes your life easiler why not?
danpalmer 3y ago
Why would the inbound be more complex? Inbound they're basically taking credit cards, and while they probably have a few card processors they use and some complexity around taking different cards via different processors in different countries, it's not too complex. Outbound, they're paying into bank accounts (more complex), in many different countries with different protocols for bank transfers, with significant reporting and auditing requirements, invoicing, etc. Also paying on different timescales for different things – whether bulk purchasing inventory, paying for on-demand bookings, etc. Payment terms will vary by many factors including who the payee is. Some payees like large chains may have their own accounting systems that need to be integrated with. I'd have generally assumed that outbound would be much more complex!
- ajhurliman 3y ago
  I believe it was sarcasm; of course they’ll continue collecting money and not paying people during maintenance, because who doesn’t want more money?
  - benjaminwootton 3y ago
    It was sarcasm but I still would hazard a guess that the public facing payments are harder than the backend payment runs. A few thoughts as a non expert: They might take thousands of bookings for a single hotel, so the volume of inbound payments is significantly more. Public facing payments have to operate 24/7. They have to deal with fraud and bad actors. Transactions need to be real time rather than batch. They need to support all kinds of international payments. They have to take payments over web, mobile and call centres. They have to support PCI and GDPR compliance on the customer side. I’m sure neither side is easy at their scale, but B2C sounds much trickier to me even though there are opportunities to outsource on both sides.
- newhotelowner 3y ago
  In the USA, they pay hotels through prepaid credit cards. CC is attached to each reservation. And the hotel charges the card on the day guest arrives. It may be complex, but they only give hotels 5 days for reconciliation, and won't accept any changes after 5 days.

berbec 3y ago

This is some new definition of the word "need" that I am unaware of. Methinks a liquidity problem is the true culprit.

spyke112 3y ago
To be fair, payment in is probably handled completely differently through a payment service provider as card payment, where as payment out probably is bank transfers, which I would imagine is not as easy.
mschuster91 3y ago
Unless they've been doing shit like paying for promotion discounts in a "snowball" pyramid scheme - which I don't believe - they should not have a liquidity problem, quite the contrary, as people pay weeks to months in advance. The interesting thing is... what's with the hosts who get into financial difficulties after 10 days of delayed payments. I get it that three years of a pandemic, the consequences of the Ruzzian war, and inflation have been a drain on everyone's reserves - but not even ten days of runway? Holy shit.
- fphhotchips 3y ago
  It's not 10 days; it's (up to) almost a month: > payments for guests checking out from June 28 would be delayed and all paid out in one go on July 24. That said, it sounds like payments are normally delayed by 10 days from checkout. Of course, apparently some payments "could be delayed until August", so all I can say with authority is that this is a mess.
  - mschuster91 3y ago
    Okay now that is an entirely different amount of mess (and completely unacceptable), still troubling to see businesses having such a low amount of runway. I mean, anything could drive them into disaster at that point, even an unrelated natural disaster cutting off the roads to the village or whatever.
    - KidJhb 3y ago
      Came across this thread as I am owed well over 60 bed nights by BdotC. Say what you like about lack of runway, bear in mind that I bore all the costs for this accommodation upfront, some of it since May. Everything. If I had let those rooms out on another platform I would have been paid on check-in. Why are they robbing the little guys, what is going on with their cash flow? A switchover can happen overnight, with the right planning, there should be no need to delay payments by 3 months!
zippercreatemy 3y ago
100% has to be a liquidity issue. I am guessing that they invest the funds in trust in overnight markets and someone has had too many losses.
- sally1984 3y ago
  They are sponsoring FIFA women's football world cup 2023. Definitely, not bankruptcy or liquidity issue.
- jsumrall 3y ago
  That would be quite the story, as I have the impression that Booking is absurdly profitable.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    That's what they said about Van Moof, and plenty of other companies that ultimately went bankrupt. They had a pretty bad loss two quarters ago: "Net income was $266 million, compared with a net loss of $700 million in the prior-year quarter" https://s201.q4cdn.com/865305287/files/doc_financials/2023/q1/Q1-2023-BKNG-Earnings-Release.pdf https://s201.q4cdn.com/865305287/files/doc_financials/2023/q...
    - sally1984 3y ago
      payments to hosts over IT techni... Please visit this group in FB which was created to register all the concerns from hosts and guests from all over the world. We can collectively work together to fix this situation. https://m.facebook.com/groups/1316864141779135/ https://m.facebook.com/groups/1316864141779135/
- wewilldieanyway 3y ago
  Hahah, I wish. Booking stock is at an all-time-high at the moment, and we could have made very good money if they indeed had a liquidity problem. Poor tech + poor timing. Take off the tinfoil hats.
arp242 3y ago
While I lack direct first-person experience, I've heard some pretty harrowing tales about the state of booking.com's backend over the years from multiple independent sources, which makes me think that "technical reasons" is at least plausible. Also, from a quick search, Booking seems to be doing fine financially.
delfinom 3y ago
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck
mrweasel 3y ago
Seems more or at least equally realistic that someone screwed up and now Booking.com won't admit that they are scrambling to fix something on the backend.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  Scrambling implies something quick. This has been going on for too long to use that term.

siva7 3y ago

They're setting their priorities straight.

that_guy_iain 3y ago

They don't lose money if they slow down their payouts but they do lose money if they stop accepting money. Basically, they can just down outbound payments for 10 days and not really lose any business. For most places it's probably not going to be that much of a problem they need to wait 10 days for a payment. If you can do something and it makes your life easiler why not?

danpalmer 3y ago

Why would the inbound be more complex? Inbound they're basically taking credit cards, and while they probably have a few card processors they use and some complexity around taking different cards via different processors in different countries, it's not too complex. Outbound, they're paying into bank accounts (more complex), in many different countries with different protocols for bank transfers, with significant reporting and auditing requirements, invoicing, etc. Also paying on different timescales for different things – whether bulk purchasing inventory, paying for on-demand bookings, etc. Payment terms will vary by many factors including who the payee is. Some payees like large chains may have their own accounting systems that need to be integrated with. I'd have generally assumed that outbound would be much more complex!

ajhurliman 3y ago
I believe it was sarcasm; of course they’ll continue collecting money and not paying people during maintenance, because who doesn’t want more money?
- benjaminwootton 3y ago
  It was sarcasm but I still would hazard a guess that the public facing payments are harder than the backend payment runs. A few thoughts as a non expert: They might take thousands of bookings for a single hotel, so the volume of inbound payments is significantly more. Public facing payments have to operate 24/7. They have to deal with fraud and bad actors. Transactions need to be real time rather than batch. They need to support all kinds of international payments. They have to take payments over web, mobile and call centres. They have to support PCI and GDPR compliance on the customer side. I’m sure neither side is easy at their scale, but B2C sounds much trickier to me even though there are opportunities to outsource on both sides.
newhotelowner 3y ago
In the USA, they pay hotels through prepaid credit cards. CC is attached to each reservation. And the hotel charges the card on the day guest arrives. It may be complex, but they only give hotels 5 days for reconciliation, and won't accept any changes after 5 days.