222 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM were unanimously opposed to any updates to existing competition rules, arguing that the digital sector remains highly competitive and subjective to disruption. Booking.com, however, in a break from all others, argued in favour of strengthening the Commissions’ competition enforcement resources, in part, to avoid the patchwork of investigations and enforcement actions Booking.com has faced from individual EU Member States. b) Expedia Faces Traveller Fee Lawsuit Alleging Tax Fraud and Racketeering, Skift Travel News, 19 December 2018 “Seattle Law Firm Again Pursuing Expedia”: Seattle law firm Hagens Berman filed a suit this past week seeking classaction status and accusing Expedia and Expedia Affiliate Network (EAN) member, Reservations.com, of tax fraud and racketeering. Hagens Berman, a well-known consumer class action firm, was previously part of earlier class-action litigation that Expedia settled in 2009, which arose out of Expedia’s practices concerning the collection of fees and charges. In contrast to the prior claims, these newest claims arose out of Reservations.com’s practices of charging “tax recovery fees and charges” on Expedia’s behalf. According to the complaint, these excessive fees and charges are then remitted by Reservations.com back to Expedia for payment to hotels of the applicable tax amount with the excess retain by Expedia. Expect more updates on this story as the litigation progresses. c) Travel agents want EU antitrust probe into Lufthansa surcharges Reuters – Business News, 19 December 2018 Travel lobbying group ETTSA, whose members include Amadeus (AMA.MC) and Booking.com, on Wednesday urged EU antitrust regulators to investigate Lufthansa’s (LHAG.DE) surcharges and other allegedly discriminatory measures against travel agents. d) Report: OTAs are in rate parity with major chains Hotel Management News, 19 December 2018 OTAs are more likely to be in parity with major chains than independents and local chains, according to a recently released report from OTA Insight. “The North American Hotel Parity Report” examines rate-parity trends for second-quarter 2018 and shows there are significant parity-loss issuesmarketwide, with independents and local chains facing losses: 46% of tracked shops in comparison to 33% for major chains. A significant majority of parity loss from
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