A woman has revealed how she was hit with £3.4 million worth of fake bookings after becoming victim to an elaborate phishing scam which has tarnished her business.
When Victoria Pollard received an email from Booking.com to say her contact details had been changed, she simply thought it was an admin error.
But, in the days that followed, the 46-year-old holiday home owner was faced with an onslaught of emails and calls from extremely unhappy holiday-goers and corporate guests, who were calling her business a ‘scam’.
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Confused, she contacted the accommodation booking website to find out what was going on.
It turned out her accounts had been hacked and all legitimate listings were removed, before being replaced with ‘fake’ ones that asked for payment via an external link.
As a result, those who booked turned up to a location that didn’t exist – but Victoria’s business name was the one attached and so was tarnished completely.
Now, she’s sharing the horrific ordeal which has left her – and the business – in turmoil.
“This scam has had a huge effect on my business and personal life,” Victoria, who owns Lifes2Short – a holiday rentals company – and is based in Exeter, Devon, told What’s The Jam.
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“[I’ve struggled to] see the light at the end of the tunnel.
“In one day, we had 10,000 fake bookings being made to the fake rentals, which were attached to my business name.
“I’m the one who had to try to keep up with all the emails and correspondence.
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“I was even forced to put my phone into airplane mode because I was receiving up to 30 calls per minute.
“Disappointed bookers have called us all the names under the sun, saying we have ruined their lives and holidays, since they had nowhere to stay.
“It’s been absolute carnage.
“I’ve had to put my whole business on hold.”
Victoria, who has over nine listings, has built her rentals business up from scratch for the past 12 years.
She was informed of the contact details change on 4 August 2026.
Suddenly, each one of her listings dropped off the website one-by-one.
After escalating this to Booking.com, it was hoped that would be the end of it.
However, it quickly became clear that the nightmare was only just beginning.
She said: “The back end of our account and listings were hacked, meaning the hackers were able to take full control.
“They advertised my accommodation as being based in London, four hours away from us, and once booked, they would send a private payment link via Booking.com.
“It said that if the balance wasn’t paid within 12 hours, the booking would be cancelled.
“As soon as the money was in, they stopped replying
“The locations people turned up to were derelict sites.
“When I spoke to Booking.com, they didn’t really understand how bad this was.”
To date, she’s dealt with over 2,100 phone calls, as well as 300 emails and messages, from disgruntled guests.
Due to the ongoing issue, her accounts have been frozen, meaning that outstanding payments from around the time of the scam have yet to be made and that legitimate bookings can’t be placed – plummeting Victoria and her business into financial trouble.
She’s had to fork out for a security expert to check all their systems and at one point owed, on paper, £3.4 million in refunds for the fake bookings.
These refunds, however, have been returned by the website, rather than from Victoria’s pocket.
Not only that, she claims that Booking.com charged her £42,984.17 as ‘commission’, which left her believing that her business was ‘over’.
Luckily, this was reversed by her bank – though she says the company has continued to reach out to her for the payment, while adding late fees to the amount.
Victoria had raised this with Report Fraud, though they were unable to conduct further investigation, citing ‘insufficient viable lines of enquiry’.
She is now at her wits end and still has no answers on how this happened – and why it hasn’t been resolved.
The only action that has been taken to date is the removal of the fake listings.
She added: “They’re saying that all reviews can’t be removed; even those who never stayed at my rentals are calling me a scam.
“I will never use Booking.com again.
“I’m not giving up, as I refuse to let my business that I’ve worked so hard on be destroyed.”
A spokesperson for Booking.com told Jam Press: “Our investigation indicates that criminals likely targeted the property through a phishing attack.
“The messages encouraged the partner to click links or download attachments outside our platform, which led to malware being installed on the property’s systems and temporary unauthorised access to its Booking.com account.
“We understand the frustration this complex situation has caused.
“We have been working closely with the property owner to provide our full support and guidance, including on recalling payments that may have been processed automatically.
“We have also confirmed that we will remove reviews left on the altered listings.
“Some invoices and follow-up messages are generated automatically through our systems.
“However, we found no record that the accommodation owner was told they were liable for refunds on this scale.
“Booking.com supported customers with impacted stays through relocations, refunds, or free cancellations, depending on their individual circumstances.
“We remain in close contact with the property owner and continue to support them.”
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