How hotel booking sites are about to change

A group of major hotel booking sites have vowed to stop using misleading discount claims and high-pressure selling tactics, after the UK’s competition watchdog ruled they could prevent customers from finding the best deals and even amount to breaches of consumer law.

The Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA) has investigated leading price-comparison sites Expedia, Booking.com, Agoda, Hotels.com, ebookers and trivago.

With 70% of people researching hotels using booking sites, CMA said it was clamping down on practices that give a false impression of a hotel’s popularity, with claims such as “one room left at this price” and “booked four times in the last 24 hours”.

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The CMA also raised concerns about hidden charges and commissions paid by some hotels, which affect search results.

Among the “major changes” announced by the regulator are rules to make search results clearer, end pressure selling, provide more clarity on discounts and display all compulsory charges in the headline price.

“The websites have a deadline of 1 September to make the changes or face further action,” reports The Guardian. It points out that not all of the firms are engaged in the dubious practices, but all have agreed to abide by the principles set out by the CMA.

Kate Nicholls, chief executive of hospitality trade association UKHospitality, told The Daily Telegraph the CMA’s recommendations “will simultaneously add a level of protection for accommodation businesses that have too often lost out via unfair practices”.

The BBC says “the CMA will now seek to make the rest of the sector follow the same rules as the six companies it has named”.