Setting aside the fact that as a consumer, not having a confirmation email is a giant red flag that would have avoided much of this... one thing that OTAs can d

Setting aside the fact that as a consumer, not having a confirmation email is a giant red flag that would have avoided much of this... one thing that OTAs can do is interface with low-level supplier APIs to know whether/when the status of a booking has changed. Of course, this isn't perfect, to be sure - but they sometimes do implement it well, and when working, this can give a second line of defense beyond just what's available with the hotel's own website, which often a smaller subset of information than the OTAs have access to.