Balancing the needs of travellers with those of the airlines and airport hotels is a tricky exercise; and when things don't go according to plan, it's often the traveller who suffers.Take overbooking, for example: Airlines around the world routinely overbook flights in anticipation of no-shows, ensuring that they don't get left with too few bums on seats.Occasionally they get it wrong, and end up "bumping off" passengers with paid-for seats, but thanks to the Consumer Protection Act, when they do, they have to make it up to the affected passengers.Properly.Here's what travellers need to know: The Act states that if a company accepts a reservation and then fails to supply the goods or service at the agreed time and place - or something similar or better - because of lack of stock or capacity, the company must refund the consumer with interest, plus compensate them "for costs directly incidental to the supplier's breach of contract".If the consumer accepts the offer of a comparable substitute, no compensation is necessary.For years I've received complaints from consumers who have been bumped off planes because of overbooking, but I recently received a hotel overbooking case - and what a lulu it was.Sharon Golding of Westville, KwaZulu-Natal, a leadership development facilitator, flew from Nairobi on March 18, landing at Johannesburg's OR Tambo airport at 1am. Her travel agent had booked and paid for a room for her in the City Lodge at the airport and had advised the hotel of her late arrival.With a flight booked to Durban at 8am that morning, Golding was naturally desperate to get to sleep as soon as possible.It was close to 2am by the time she had cleared customs and got herself, her luggage and her bulky presenting apparatus to the hotel's reception, only to be told that there was a "big problem" - the hotel was overbooked and her room was no longer available.The manager on duty told an angry and distraught Golding, with an alarming lack of empathy or apology, she says, that she would be driven to the City Lodge in Barbara Road, more than 5km away, where a room had been booked for her, and arrangements had been made to get her back to the airport for her flight home.On that night, the Barbara Road standard room rate was R285 less than what had been paid for Golding's room in the OR Tambo hotel. With no choice at that stage, Golding begrudgingly allowed herself to be driven to the other City Lodge where, contrary to what she'd been told, she hadn't been booked in and neither had any transport been arranged for her back to the airport.But the staff at the hotel, particularly the duty manager, were outstanding, Golding said.She later received a written apology from the assistant manager of the OR Tambo hotel, offering her two complimentary breakfasts as compensation for her experience, a response Golding described as "underwhelming".It was clearly not in keeping with the Act either, as I later pointed out to City Lodge's head office, because the hotel room substitution was by no means "comparable" and Golding had agreed to it only because she had no choice.Responding, Ross Phinn, the City Lodge Group's divisional director of operations, agreed that the offer of compensation was "not good enough" and totally impractical, given that Golding lives in Durban.The hotel in question had accepted guests booked on a delayed flight, hence the overbooking, but given Golding's late arrival, her booking should not have been affected, Phinn said.He conceded that the rates difference and "inconvenience" of having to travel to the Barbara Road hotel made it an inferior substitution for Golding's original booking.Asked why Golding hadn't been booked into the more expensive Tsogo Sun Intercontinental hotel instead, he said that hotel was also fully booked at the time, due to the delayed flight.As for why Golding wasn't told about the problem in advance, he said overbooking situations arose "at very short notice" and that she would have been on her flight at the time."We apologise unreservedly for Ms Golding's experience at City Lodge Hotel at OR Tambo Airport," he said.Golding has since been offered a refund, as well as a complimentary three-night stay in any Courtyard, City Lodge or Town Lodge for two people for three complementary nights, including breakfast.Now that's more like it.What a pity that without media intervention her "compensation" would have amounted to the offer of two breakfasts she could benefit from only after first incurring the cost of travelling to Johannesburg.CONTACT WENDY:E-mail: consumer@knowler.co.zaTwitter: @wendyknowlerIs the overbooking of hotel rooms a routine thing?"City Lodge, as with most accommodation establishments, does allow the overbooking of hotel rooms to maximise occupancy," said Ross Phinn, the City Lodge Group's divisional director of operations."City Lodge OR Tambo in particular experiences a high number of no-shows and guests also fail to notify the hotel of their intentions. Our policy is exactly as per the act in that we will make alternative arrangements in a hotel of similar or better grading."We are fortunate that calculations very seldom fail. There are so many situations that occur at an airport hotel when management is forced into a corner to try to 'help' people out."In this case it was, unfortunately, to the detriment of another guest, namely Ms Golding."..