Money deducted for pre authorization hold

Question

I was in a hotel recently and they did a pre-authorization hold on the debit card.
It was initially shown as real charge in my banking app, the hotel staff told me to not worry it's just a pre authorization hold and it will be released after check out( this was not part of the price, just a deposit).
However, after checking out, the money never returned. The hotel insists that it was released, my bank says they see a full, true charge.
Bank said I can file for charge back if the hotel doesn't reply to formally asking for proof of cancellation.
My question is, how can this happen? Is the malice of an involved party? Is this because it was a debit card rather than credit card?
Could it be that it was because my bank account is not in the same country as the hotels account?
I have tried to find related things online and was surprised that there isn't much info on the matter.

RonJohn · Answer

My question is, how can this happen?

Humans are imperfect.

They fat-finger things and write buggy code.
They're defensive and lazy, too, not wanting to admit to mistakes.
Computers just make mistakes faster.

Is the malice of an involved party?

Hanlon's razor: never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Having said that... remember the Wells Fargo scandal?  Sometimes people are stupid, and sometimes people are corrupt.

Is this because it was a debit card rather than credit card?

Yes. This problem can only happen when using a debit card (which is one reason why I never use debit cards, the other being fraud protection).

Money deducted for pre authorization hold

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