In April, Sergey Voytovich, CEO of Svoy TS, which owns its own hotel booking system for travel agencies, SvoyHotel, approached the Ministry of Culture with a proposal to ban Booking.com's operations in Russia. One of the retaliatory measures against US sanctions. He believes such a ban would help Russian companies operate in the hotel booking market. Currently, Booking.com holds 70% of the market share, and similar Russian systems are unable to compete.
On Wednesday, Rostourism sent inquiries to relevant public associations asking them to assess the possibility of restricting Booking.com's operations in Russia and the market implications of such a move. However, after the media reported this, Olga Yarilova, Director of the Ministry of Culture's Department of Tourism and Regional Policy, stated that she "has no authority to ban the use of the Booking.com service, nor does she have any plans to regulate its operations in the Russian Federation." She also stated that she "categorically opposes such a proposal in principle."
According to her, the letter was sent to Rostourism, the relevant agency, in accordance with the procedure for reviewing appeals from Russian citizens, with the aim of preparing a response, and this is a standard technical procedure.
Competitors against
"Given that Booking.com is a very strong competitor for us, I'm certainly in favor. We support the exclusion of any competitor from the business. However, these aren't entirely appropriate or adequate measures. A ban is only possible if Booking.com violates the country's regulations and laws, and that's not entirely appropriate right now. This could set the wheels in motion, leading to negative consequences," says Alexander Kurnosov, Deputy CEO of Academservice, the owner of the Acase.ru hotel booking system.
His colleagues from the resort rental service Tvil.ru agree with him.
"Booking.com is certainly a competitor for us. We work with resort property owners in Crimea. If Booking.com bans them for any reason, they come to us, and vice versa. But we advocate for healthy competition in the market. This ban won't lead to anything good," a Booking.com representative told Interfax-Tourism.
There will be no void in the market
At the same time, Janis Dzenis, PR director of the hotel search service Aviasales, believes that Russians will not stop booking hotels even if the American service leaves.
"Aviasales (as with flights) searches hotels through a huge database of agencies. These include both foreign and Russian booking services. There are alternatives, we've always talked about that. I highly doubt the planned bans will wipe out online hotel bookings," he said.
A Tvil.ru representative noted that hoteliers estimate the share of bookings made through Booking.com to be the largest on the market.
"Hoteliers say that Booking brings in the most customers of all online services. But that doesn't mean it should be banned. We believe the market is large enough, and there's room for everyone—both foreign and Russian services," he emphasized.
Foreign wrestling practices
Booking.com is the world's largest hotel booking service, founded in the Netherlands in 1996. In 2005, it was acquired by the American company Pricelines Group, which was renamed Booking Holdings in 2018. It also controls Kayak and Agoda.
Every day, more than 950,000 overnight stays in hotels and other accommodations worldwide are booked on Booking.com, which is available in 42 languages. The service has previously been the subject of numerous complaints in various countries. For example, in France, the site was accused of price gouging and violating antitrust laws. Similar accusations have been made in Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and Sweden.
In March 2017, an Istanbul court ruled to ban access to Booking.com in Turkey following a lawsuit filed by the Turkish Travel Agencies Association. The formal reason for this move was that Booking.com's management violated local competition law, which had complicated the operations of Turkish travel agencies. The decision to block the service followed a scandal in which Dutch authorities blocked the flight carrying Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who was planning to attend a rally in Rotterdam. Booking.com had previously been fined approximately €1,400,000 in Turkey, also for violating competition law.
Source: tourism.interfax.ru
