Ubud Travel Forum

I have booked a hotel in Ubud. However, after several interchanges via E-mail, they have told me that that they will meet me at the airport upon my arrival to give me the hotel voucher & collect payment (preferably in cash), even though I will not be staying at their hotel until 4 more days after my arrival. Is this normal in Bali?

Here's their response to my previous E-mail. Does this make sense to anyone out there? Is this true?:

About payment.
Since the Bank in Bali have new rules that all of the payment by credit
card must do with Electric card payment and we not yet have this. Cause
this rules we can not do the payment by Credit card.

Manual payment already expired and will be change by Electric card.

Would you please pay the room by cash in USD ? if no would you please pay
it cash in Rupiah.

Why you have to pay in advance? cause hotel regulation the payment must
settled in advance 5 days before arrival. Otherwise room will be released.

This did not happen to us when we went to Bali last November. We paid the hotel by credit card by the end of our stay. Are you dealing with agencies or straight with the hotel itself?

I was dealing with the hotel directly, but it still seems like some kind of a scam. So I told them to cancel my reservation & booked another hotel.

I don`t know more about this but just come directly and get the hotel by your self

Pre-payment of hotels is common practice when booking a package and purchasing that package through an agent, but this is not a common practice when booking directly with the hotel. In that case, a deposit is generally required, (normally the equivalent of a one night stay) and cancellation fees are applicable. That of course is fairly standard.

Some of the small hotel operations may require full payment in advance, especially for short stays. Their reasoning is that they can’t afford to have their rooms empty, especially during peak seasons. There is a great deal of factual truth in that. Repeat guests are more inclined to go along with this if they really enjoyed their previous stay and got on really well with the family that often own and operate these smaller facilities.

Hotel scams in Bali are rare...but not totally unheard of. The Bali tourism ministry here is strong, and they will take action (including bringing in the police) in cases of hotel fraud.

Bali’s tourism suffered greatly after the two bombings and they realize very well that they cannot afford any sort of a bad reputation.