Growing tension between hoteliers and OTAs

October 19, 2009 |

In 2008, over 60% of Expedia's revenue came from transactions involving the booking of hotel reservations, with less than 15% of its worldwide revenue derived from the sale of airline tickets. Clearly, hotels is where the action is with OTAs, and explains the pressure hotels increasingly receive, when renewing their contracts with Expedia & Co.

By Max Starkov

This Just In: I have just heard through the industry grapevine that Expedia has cut off negotiations with Choice Hotels and has removed Choice properties from its sites, which include Expedia.com and Hotels.com. Choice Hotels, similar to all other major hotel brands, has been working consistently to negotiate a renewal of a brand-wide wholesale agreement with Expedia.

For some time now, we have been hearing from many industry sources that during renewal negotiations Expedia/Hotels.com has demanded new terms and conditions that are against everything the hospitality industry stands for: last room availability, guarantees that the best rates are only found on Expedia/Hotels.com sites, penalties to properties that do not use their sites 100% of the time, etc. These contract renewal

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