Hello,
I have paid a deposit for one night in November for one dorm bed at AIJ youth hostel in Paris (bastille area). Visit their website here:
http://aijparis.com.
Basically I found free accomodation and asked to cancel the booking and they said they could not refund me the deposit (which I knew) but I could transfer it to someone else or another date. Since I have no plans to return to Paris in the next few months I'm offering to transfer it to someone here. The loss of the cash isn't a big deal to me (13.00 Euros) so I wouldn't ask for anything in return because either way I'm out the money.
However, if you're ever around Nottingham, UK I wouldn't turn down a drink.
This is seriously not a joke and I will send you all the email communication between me and them. I just figured someone was nice to me by letting me stay at their place for a few days for free, so I'm going to pass it along. Reach me however you want. Right now the booking is for November 2 but they said I could move it to any date more than three days away from the day I email them requesting the change.