Booking.com reviews

4.1

80% would recommend to a friend

(7,615 total reviews)
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Glenn Fogel

71% approve of CEO

68% positive business outlook

Booking.com has an employee rating of 4.1 out of 5 stars, based on 7,615 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an excellent working experience there. The Booking.com employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

8K reviews
2.0
Apr 19, 2017

Toxic Environment

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The diversity is amazing, free coffee, free fruit and all the free junk food you could want, access to a gym in the building, great Team Lead group, one good manager.

Cons

It's been a few months since I've left and it's really become apparent how toxic the office environment is there. Team Leads are exploited for their labor - they are salary, but all the benefit of that arrangement goes to the company; Team Leads still have to work crazy shifts, holidays, precious little flexibility, vacations denied for silly reasons, it is looked down on to request comp time for meetings outside of shift/overtime. There should be some benefit to the employee when moving to salary, but it's clear that the company was just looking for unpaid overtime and that's the focus. Although I will say that at the time I left, they were making baby steps and allowing TL's to take half days from time to time and comp time if our overtime hours became excessive (although this was open to interpretation by direct managers) - that is how it should be, so good on them!! There was also a weird amount of competition between some of the TL's that was encouraged from the top - rather than working together toward common goals, it was very much about getting ahead at any cost. This resulted in more than one really tense meeting with people shouting - quite bizarre in a professional environment and wholly unnecessary. Some TL's did thrive in that kind of environment - if you're a competitive person by nature or prefer to work individually over teamwork, this could be a great fit for you. It was also a bit disturbing how the (unspoken) expectation was for every employee to have the same personality - employees were indeed evaluated on this quarterly (the company values, which are great on paper, were often interpreted as teamwork = loud and talkative) and this was also a consideration for who to promote internally. If you already fit into this mold, great! If you are at all reserved/reflective, this will likely be viewed as a flaw. There was also quite a bit of mixed messaging around metrics - although we were told that the focus was moving toward coaching to the right behaviors, there was still in practice a huge amount of pressure to meet metrics. This was confusing and made it difficult to manage teams. Additionally, I didn't feel particularly protected as an employee - it seemed the agents were able to speak to us however they wanted with no recourse. Don't get me wrong - most of the agents were so wonderful and I'm not so thin skinned that I can't take standard criticism between a Team Lead and their direct report, but when I start to feel unsafe being alone in the same room as one of my agents, there needs to be some recourse or protection for the TL. My impression that a lot of these issues are unique to the Bellevue office. Booking is a great company overall, they do great things and really work hard to support their employees and make it a great place to work.

4.0
Aug 1, 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

More so than customer service, you're actually playing the 3rd party or middle ground between Hotel and guests who booked through Booking.com. The normal phone calls consists of cancel reservation requests to answering questions about the hotel the potential guest are trying to book. There is a set of procedure you need to follow regarding complaints, so if you memorize and know it well, this job is no challenge at all.

Cons

I enjoyed working at this place, but the attendant policy was too overwhelming. The company uses a point-formula where you're basically given 6 points to lose until you're terminated. For every time you call in, you get a point taken away. if you happen to call in on a weekend when you're scheduled, you lose two points. You can absolutely regain your points, but you'd have to have perfect attendance (no tardy or absence) for 30-days in order to gain back one point. Ridiculously, when you get 3 points taken away, your team leader would ask you for a one-on-one talk and basically warns you on what's going to happen if you keep losing points. Also, you are basically put on a probation for 1 month until you gain back your point to drop it down to 2. What probation means is that you cannot bid to change your schedule or even consider changing department/promotion opportunities.

1.0
Jun 14, 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

I would say the same that all reviews mention in Pros: Nice office, free coffee & fruits and that's about it! The office and especially restrooms are crowded due to 450 employees has been working there.

Cons

Booking has insufficient employees Performance evaluation by Productivity and Guest Satisfaction. Expectations the following: Productivity - no less than 5.5 guests per hour and Satisfaction -at least - 95%.Looks easy but don't be happy. The company is overwhelmed with guests' complains due to the very strange way of them running their business. When guests enter their Credit Card on Booking website they believe they pay Booking so when they call Booking with questions about charges or room related questions Booking cannot answer it as Booking doesn't charge guests. Booking reps have to investigate and to seek the answer from hotels what takes some time.That way of doing their business creates a lot of frustrations with the guests and a lot of guests complains. How will you achieve your Productivity and Guest Satisfaction if you are on the phone with the same guest for 2 hours because hotel cannot find guest booking or cannot accommodate guest with the right room or has no any room available to accommodate the guest? You must find the solution like some alternate hotel (if you are able to) and then to advise guest to book it online quickly because you cannot book it for the guest!!! I have never seen such craziness in my life. I have been working in travel company and in Hotel reservation before and it was easy, simple and enjoyable - answer guests questions and proceed with booking. That is not the case in Booking. Second huge con is super inexperienced young Management. Management knows the Booing operating system they know the company business policy but they have no idea how to manage all that diverse people. Due to the rapid company growth they promote to management positions within company to save the money on experience outsiders. Your manager can be 23-27 years person from oversees who has never been a manager and has no idea what is appropriate and what is not by US workplace culture standards. For example you can be ordered on your lunch time to go walking on the parking lot to manage your stress and frustrations from bad customers. But then when are you going to eat your lunch? And you have only 10 minutes a day for your personal needs ( like restrooms). And if you maximize it you better drink less water and go less otherwise you'll get negative points toward your attendance. If you get sick and even bring medical doctor paper they'll still count a missed day as a negative point on your attendance. And if you are not in your 20-th like most of Booking employees and you are older and experienced and respect yourself you will not feel good about being under such management and under such army rules. The pay in Booking is very low that's why most of the employees young or immigrants for who it is OK to start with $13/h. Don't be fool with all those free coffees & fruits and free lunches. Find the company that will pay you enough to buy your lunches coffees and fruits.

Viewing 58 - 60 of 7,615 Reviews

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