Duff on Hospitality Law

This week’s client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the week ending February 24, 2017 is below. Several interesting OTA stories this week, including an update on another Seattle-based travel distribution company, Utrip.

This week’s client OTA & Distribution Update for the week ending February 10, 2017 is below. A few more stories in this week’s update in comparison to the last few weeks of update. Plus, given the increasing importance of loyalty programs and the critical role they now play in many hoteliers’ distribution strategies (e.g. direct book), we plan to start tracking and featuring important loyalty program stories – this week’s update features the first loyalty program story of many to come.

Our friends (and former contributors) at Seattle-based BrandVerity produced the latest detailed study of how trademark bidders are hurting branded keywords.

Branded keywords generate some of your highest converting traffic. But that makes them a prime target for trademark bidders who steal your clicks, drive up your costs, and even mislead your customers.

The report on Branded Keywords looks at trademark bidding across 250+ popular brands in 10 industries to find out just how much damage trademark bidding is causing. The full report is available for download today at https://www.brandverity.com/branded-keywords/.

Our weekly client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the week ended February 3, 2017 is below. Nothing too important to report this week, though a report from our December 19, 2016 Update seems particularly relevant and worth repeating given recent developments in Southern California.

Back in December, we reported on the California Supreme Court’s decision not to impose on net rate OTAs operating in the state the obligation to pay local lodging taxes on amounts collected and retained by the OTAs over and above the applicable net rate. As part of our Update, we noted that never-before-seen language contained in the Court’s decision suggested that local jurisdictions could pursue hoteliers directly for the unpaid taxes. A copy of our update is below. We have now learned from several of you that at least two California cities (Anaheim and San Diego) are now using the decision to assert claims for unpaid taxes. Apparently, both AH&LA and many of the large brands are currently involved in efforts to resolve these claims either with the cities themselves or through the OTAs (in reliance on the indemnity protections contained in many of the larger OTA distribution contracts). If you have questions about these claims or the industry’s coordinated response to the claims, please let us know.

This week’s OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the week ending January 27, 2017 is below. Not a lot of news to report this week; surprisingly little came out of this past week’s Americas Lodging Investment Summit (ALIS) in Los Angeles.

Our weekly client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the week ending January 20, 2017 is below. Not a lot of significant developments this past week, but next week’s Americas Lodging Investment Summit (ALIS) in Los Angeles may produce a few interesting announcements. If you are attending ALIS and interested in connecting, shoot me an email.

Our weekly OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the week ending January 13, 2017 is below. This week’s update offers something from everyone.

Our first client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for 2017 is below. Not a lot to report this week, so we will keep the Update short.

• • Short-Term Rentals’ Share of Lodging Industry Expected to Continue Growing [Short-Term Rentals]. In the latest report attempting to predict the long-term effect of short-term rentals on the lodging industry, financial analyst Susquehanna International Group (SIG) predicts that by 2018 short-term rentals will make up nearly 20% of the overall global lodging market. SIG further predicts that Booking.com and Expedia (and their broad range of offerings, including short-term rentals) stand the most to gain from the continued growth in the short-term rental industry.

My final client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for 2016 is below. It has been a quite week in the world of distribution. Here’s to a 2017 filled with much success and happiness. Happy New Year.

Loyalists More Likely to Use Airbnb [SHORT-TERM RENTALS]. According to a December 22 report issued by Morgan Stanley, hotel loyalty program members are the most frequent users of Airbnb. Apparently, this phenomenon remains true even if you consider the fact that Airbnb users are likely to be those that travel most frequently. Just imagine what might happen if Airbnb created an effective loyalty program . . .

Our weekly client OTA & Travel Distribution Update for the short week ending December 22, 2016 is below. This week’s update is brief one.

Long-Awaited Outcome to US Airways Suit Is Finally Here [GDS]. A federal jury found last week following an 8-week trial that Sabre had restrained trade by forcing unfavorable contract terms on its supplier, US Airways, and awarded US Airways $15 million in damages. At issue were the terms and conditions contained in Sabre’s GDS contract, including the contract’s “full content” provision that required US Airways to provide Sabre access to all of US Airways’ seats.