{"id":151317,"date":"2025-06-02T05:37:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-02T05:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/151317\/"},"modified":"2025-06-02T05:37:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-02T05:37:09","slug":"class-action-suit-filed-against-booking-com-in-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/151317\/","title":{"rendered":"Class action suit filed against Booking.com in Europe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hotels across Europe
\nare being encouraged to join a class
\naction against Booking.com<\/a> to reclaim potentially billions of euros in overpaid commissions.<\/p>\n

The action is being
\nlaunched in the Netherlands, where Booking.com<\/a>
\nhas its head office, and is being co-ordinated through a Dutch foundation
\ncalled the Stichting Hotel Claim Alliance. It is being pursued by a pan-European team of
\nlawyers and economists with experience in the field of competition damage
\nclaims, including Volker Soyez, a partner in Brussels-based legal firm Schneider
\nGeiwitz & Partner (SGP).<\/p>\n

The action is being
\nlaunched following a judgement by the European Court of Justice (ECJ)
\nin September 2024<\/a> in the a long-running case between Booking.com and 63 individual
\nGerman hotels and groups, including 25hours<\/a>,
\nDorint<\/a> and Steigenberger<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The case revolves
\naround the legality of so-called parity clauses in the agreements between the online
\ntravel agency (OTA) and hoteliers.<\/p>\n

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When Booking.com
\nentered the German market in 2006, it included what is known as a \u201cwide parity\u201d
\nclause in its terms and conditions for hoteliers, which prohibited them from offering
\nrates lower than those offered on Booking.com through their own sales channels
\nor other OTAs.<\/p>\n

In a 2013 case
\ninvolving HRS<\/a>, Germany\u2019s Federal Cartel
\nOffice ruled that wide parity clauses were contrary to German and European
\nUnion laws on cartels. In 2015, Booking.com replaced the wide parity clause with
\na \u201cnarrow parity\u201d clause, which prohibited hotels from offering lower rates on
\ntheir own channels. The Federal Cartel Office subsequently ruled this was also against
\nGerman and EU competition law.<\/p>\n

The latest class action is being\u00a0supported by the European hospitality association Hotrec<\/a>, which alleged that the ECJ \u201cfound that the platform’s parity clauses breached EU competition law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEuropean hoteliers have long endured unfair conditions and inflated costs. Now is the time to stand together and seek redress. This collective action sends a strong message:\u00a0Abusive practices in the digital marketplace will not go unchallenged,\u201d\u00a0Hotrec president Alexandros Vassilikos said in a release.<\/p>\n

In an email to PhocusWire, a Booking.com spokesperson called Hotrec’s statements \u201cincorrect and misleading.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ECJ judgement did not conclude that Booking.com’s price parity clauses were anti-competitive or that they influenced competition (and this can be clearly seen in paragraph 92 of\u00a0their ruling). So, this ruling does not open the door to damage claims, and we will continue to show that parity clauses do not have an anti-competitive effect in court if needed,” the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

Taking action<\/p>\n

SGP\u2019s Soyez said the September 2024 judgement brought the situation into sharper focus. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the ECJ rendered its judgment, people across our hotel, across Europe became aware that this is not just a German issue but something that affects all hotels in Europe,\u201d Soyez said.<\/p>\n

He added that hoteliers were keen to do something but feared retaliation if they went on their own.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are larger hotels chains [that] would have been willing to fund this case on their own, but the smaller hotels do not have funds for that. After having talked to a large number of hotels of different sizes, the decision was [made] to have a funder in place who would cover all the costs and cost risks,\u201d said Soyez.<\/p>\n

Soyez said the total
\nsum involved in the action could amount to billions of euros in overpaid
\ncommission.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt depends on the
\nnumber of hotels that participate, but in the German case, we have approximately
\n2,000 hotels participating and the claims value is \u20ac750 million, without interest,\u201d
\nhe said.<\/p>\n

Hotels and groups
\nwanting to participate in the action have until July 31 to join the claim. They
\nwill need the details of how they are incorporated and the invoices they have
\nreceived from Booking.com.<\/p>\n

And the action is not
\njust limited to hotels in the EU.<\/p>\n

\u201cHotels from the
\nEuropean Economic Area, including Iceland, Norway and Lichtenstein, but also
\nthe United Kingdom and Switzerland are welcome to join,\u201d said Soyez.<\/p>\n

The company made
\nrevenues of $23.7 billion in 2024, an increase of 29.3% from 2023.<\/p>\n

In its Q4 2024
\nfinancial statement, Booking.com said, \u201cThe company is involved in
\ninvestigations related to whether Booking.com’s contractual parity arrangements
\nwith accommodation providers are anticompetitive because they require partners
\nto provide Booking.com with rates, conditions and availability at least as
\nfavorable as those offered to other [OTAs] or by the partner itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTo resolve certain
\nof the parity-related investigations, the company has from time to time made
\ncommitments regarding future business practices or activities, such as agreeing
\nto narrow the scope of its parity clauses. Some of these investigations have
\nresulted in fines and the company could incur additional fines and\/or be
\nrestricted in certain of its business practices in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Old news?<\/p>\n

Pedro Cola\u00e7o, CEO of
\nGuestCentric<\/a>, said this case feels like a \u201cblast from the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you go back 20
\nyears, people were complaining that they thought that these behaviors were
\ntruly anti-competitive,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHotels have moved
\non from this,\u201d said Cola\u00e7o. \u201cThey said OK, I need to focus on a healthy
\ndistribution mix. I need to make sure that I have good direct strategy, a good
\ntech stack, I need to make sure that my pricing is correct, that I can leverage
\nthe new Google tools and so on.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis could be
\nmillions in damages or just millions in distractions, which looks, in my
\nopinion, more likely,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The question is how
\nBooking.com will react to the action and whether it will aim to claw back any
\nnegotiated damages.<\/p>\n

Cola\u00e7o said, \u201cBooking.com
\nis going to come up with listing fees and promotion fees and all sorts of
\nstuff, and it’s going to be even more opaque. The big guys have people that run
\nspreadsheets and know exactly what they’re spending. The small guys don’t, and they
\nare just going to think that Booking.com is very inexpensive and lean even more
\ninto the big OTAs and nothing will have been achieved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soyez said, \u201cBooking
\nis in a difficult situation. It is a market dominant company with 70% market
\nshare, so whatever they do is very closely scrutinized by the regulators.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soyez does not
\nexpect for the action to extend to other OTAs in the market, such as Expedia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe situation is
\ndifferent,\u201d he said. \u201cExpedia has a market share of between 10 and 15%, which, from a competition law perspective, makes a decisive difference, and that’s why
\nwe are not looking into expanding this case to other portals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Max Starkov<\/a>,
\nhospitality technologist and digital strategist, said the dominance of
\nBooking.com in Europe is hoteliers\u2019 own doing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese
\nlawsuits are like suing the restaurant where you had a nice meal for charging
\nyou high prices,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cInstead of
\nfixing [their] own direct distribution channel and investing in technology,
\nmarketing and talent, hoteliers have been embracing the lazy man\u2019s distribution
\ngame\u2014via the OTAs. And now they are complaining that OTA distribution is too
\nexpensive? Hoteliers knew the cost of OTA distribution the moment they signed
\nup with the OTAs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Starkov
\nbelieves European hoteliers\u201460% of which are independent\u2014are averse to
\ntechnology. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey do not
\ninvest adequately, if at all, in technology, marketing and talent: Less than
\n10% of them have a CRM [customer relationship management system] and some kind
\nof guest reward program in place, and less than 15% have revenue management systems
\nin place. Websites? Last updated before the pandemic. SEO\u2014how do you spell
\nthat? AIO [artificial intelligence optimization]\u2014you are kidding, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cNo
\nwonder Booking.com has gained such dominance in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hotels across Europe are being encouraged to join a class action against Booking.com to reclaim potentially billions of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":151318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[64550,33322,4046,2000,299,5187,474,64551,1234,45018,24847,12,39431,15603,15602],"class_list":{"0":"post-151317","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-booking-holdings","9":"tag-booking-com","10":"tag-distribution","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-european","14":"tag-finance","15":"tag-financial-earnings","16":"tag-government","17":"tag-home-top-story","18":"tag-hotel","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-online-travel-agency","21":"tag-travel-booking","22":"tag-travel-planning"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114612158008579978","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/151318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}