More and more hostels (remember, "hostales" in Spanish) are requiring a credit card number when taking reservations. Why? This is to guard against the practice of the traveler making dozens of reservations, keeping one, and not cancelling the others, leaving the hostel owners, usually hard working family businesses, with an empty, unpaid room for that night.

By requiring a credit card number the above practice is deterred and patrons more likely to call and cancel if they think their credit card will be charged for the first night if they don't arrive.

Oftentimes, it's wonderful to be flexible with travel plans. This is, afterall, one adventure of visiting new places. But please be respectful towards the hard working families giving us an inexpensive, clean place to stay in their "homes". If you can't arrive ontime or need to cancel, CALL THEM, please. Thank you!!!

TIPS: For security reasons, it's not recommended to send credit card information in an email or even on an online reservation application form unless this is on a SECURE SERVER. You can see if it is a SECURE SERVER if the website address (URL) of that application page starts with: https:// the "s" in "https://" means this is a SECURE SERVER.

For higher security, one could:

FAX the credit card information directoy to the hostel

Call the hostel and give the information verbally

Send information in two emails, splitting the credit card number in two messages.