I had a similar experience when I booked a hotel in Russellville, Arkansas to view next April’s solar eclipse. The hour rooms became available for the desired night at the Econo Lodge in Russellville, I booked at $65/night - compared with $800 per night at other hotels. A couple days later, I receive a notice acknowledging “my” cancellation (as if I had canceled, which I had note) followed by an email from the hotel GM stating “I am writing to reiterate our regret that your reservation for a room which was scheduled for April 2024 was cancelled. Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, we are unable to accommodate.” In the meantime, rooms were available online for date I had previously reserved at $1,000/night.

Of course, there was nothing to reiterate as there was no prior “apology” for THEIR cancelling my reservation. Given the language of these emails, I had to conclude that the hotel realized “too late” that it missed an opportunity to jack up its rates so simply canceled early-made reservations at the rack rate in order to engage in extreme price gouging. Ultimately, I decided not to make an issue of this as we decided to skip seeing the eclipse. But I have sworn off Choice hotels.