Well here’s something you don’t see every day…
Man makes 580 bogus hotel reservations, gets arrested
A 28-year-old clinical laboratory technician has been arrested by Tokyo Metropolitan Police, and is charged with the fraudulent obstruction of business.
According to the police, the man made a total of 580 bogus hotel room reservations at a particular hotel in Tokyo’s Ota Ward (it’s not clear exactly which hotel), worth more than $114,000. Of those, 258 reservations were for a single night back in December 2024, totaling more than $49,000.
The man had reportedly made the reservations using false names and different email addresses. The police began investigating the case after being contacted by the hotel, which reported that the reservations caused the business financial harm, and stating that the reservations were made with the intent to harass.
I wonder what his problem was with the hotel
Presumably the guy made 500+ fake reservations at a hotel because he wanted to harm the property’s bottom line. However, it’s not yet clear why exactly he did this, and what his connection was to the property — the accused reportedly remained silent during questioning.
I’m not sure if he used fake credit card numbers for the reservations, or if the hotel simply doesn’t require a credit card authorization, given that Japan is a pretty high trust society (I’ve stayed at several hotels in Japan that don’t require a credit card at booking).
What this man did is certainly one way to do financial harm to a hotel, since presumably the number of bookings he made impacted the hotel’s ability to accept reservations from others.
Did he have an issue with the property’s owners? Did he have an issue with someone who worked at the property? Did he just think this was a funny joke? It’s not clear, but given the extent to which he scaled this operation, it was bound to raise some red flags.
One certainly wonders to what extent he automated this process, or otherwise, how much time it took him to make 250+ reservations for a single night.
Bottom line
A man has been arrested in Japan after booking 580 stays at a particular hotel, including 258 stays for a single night. Clearly the guy wanted to do financial harm to the hotel, and this is definitely one way to accomplish that.
It’s not clear what his motive was, though one certainly wonders if we’ll see more hotels in Japan start to require a credit card at the time if booking, to prevent situations like this in the future…
