Duff on Hospitality Law

After a few quiet weeks, last week produced a number of stories that caught our attention and made it into our weekly Update, including two interesting stories on customer reviews. Enjoy.

Booking.com Adds Loyalty Program Benefits
(“Booking.com Adds a Third-Level of Benefits to Its Loyalty Program,” April 1, 2022 via Hospitality Net - Latest Industry News)
Booking.com announced last week that it was adding a new, third tier to its Genius loyalty program. Members qualifying for this new level will enjoy discounts of up to 20 percent (as compared to discounts of 10 percent and 15 percent for first tier and second tier members, respectively), free upgrades (at participating properties), free breakfast (also at participating properties) and priority customer support (with live service agents). With this latest announcement, suppliers should again expect a big push by Booking.com to grow the number of properties in its loyalty program. Market managers will be busier than ever in trying to convince individual properties to offer deeply discounted “Genius” rates. 

As the short list of stories below reveals, last week was another quiet week in the online travel world. Enjoy.

Hopper Is the Fastest Growing Travel App in 2021
(“Hopper outperformed all other OTA apps in 2021,” March 25, 2022 via Phocus Wire)
By now, we probably shouldn’t be surprised. This past year has been quite a year for the online booking platform and fintech purveyor. Powered by the popularity of its fintech products (on average, every user purchases two fintech products with each booking), Hopper was not only the fastest growing travel app in 2021 (growing 494 percent), but in June, it bypassed Airbnb as the market share leader for active users. The other better known booking platforms also enjoyed strong growth this past year with Expedia (coming in second) growing 49 percent, Expedia’s Hotwire (coming in third) growing 33 percent and Booking.com (coming in fourth) growing 23 percent. Expedia’s vacation rental platform, Vrbo, also faired well, growing active sessions on its app by 43 percent (outpacing Airbnb) and in February this year, enjoying 1.5 million new downloads of its app. Overall, apps featuring vacation or home rentals faired better this past year versus those travel apps that did not.

Sustainability in Travel Takes Another Step Forward
(“Booking Holdings Publishes Climate Plan,” March 22, 2022 via MarketWatch)
While politicians may still debate climate change and its effects, it is becoming increasingly clear that major travel companies seeking to appeal to a younger customer base that increasingly takes climate change and sustainability seriously, are not. The latest evidence...Booking Holdings recently published its first ever climate action plan detailing the steps it intends to take to achieve near zero emissions from operations by 2030. As part of its effort, Booking’s brands intend (like so many other platforms recently) to make it easier for users to identify and book sustainable travel options.

Canada Jetlines Chooses Fareportal
(“Fareportal OTA's Chosen as Canada Jetlines First Travel Agency Partner,” March 14, 2022 via Yahoo Finance)
Interesting announcement, particularly given our story from last week.

This week’s Update features a variety of topics, including Fareportal’s deceptive sales tactics and Expedia’s self-proclaimed collaborative approach. Enjoy.

Kayak Grows Development Team
(“People on the move at KAYAK, ESA,” March 18, 2022 via Hotel Business)
While some of us might have thought that Kayak’s foray into brick and mortar locations was going to be short lived, Kayak’s announcement last week that it had hired industry veteran Indy Adenaw as Kayak Hotels’ new managing director to lead Kayak’s global expansion suggests otherwise. According to the announcement, Kayak expects to add 10 new Kayak “powered” properties this year.

Fareportal’s Use of “Dark Patterns” Results in $2.6 Million Payment
(“Attorney General James Secures $2.6 Million From Online Travel Agency for Deceptive Marketing,” March 16, 2022 via New York - Attorney General – News)
New York Attorney General, Letita James, announced last week that her office had secured a $2.6 million payment from Fareportal, operator of several discount booking platforms including CheapOair.com, related to FarePortal’s use of deceptive and misleading sales (“dark patterns”) tactics since 2017. The offending tactics were far reaching and included, among others, falsely representing the number of rooms that had been booked in a particular market, fabricating information about consumer demand for travel products and services, and posting misleading statements regarding service fees and cancellation policies. In addition to paying $2.6 million, FarePortal agreed to ensure that all future online messages, price comparisons and product disclosures would use only accurate and real time data.

As you can see from our stories below, it was a rather quiet week for online travel. Enjoy.

Want to Play a Game While You Book That Vacation Package?  
(“OYO, Hopper bet on gamification to drive user retention,” March 7, 2022 via Phocus Wire)
Yes, another story about Hopper. Last week, Skift ran an interesting story on plans by both OYO and Hopper to incorporate games into their booking platforms. Both companies view games as a means to higher user retention and ultimately to achieving the much-desired super app status. According to Hopper, it is exploring both “game theory” (using rewards to drive desired outcomes) and actual games that entertain users and drive repeat visits (and ultimately, bookings). The Chinese e-commerce site, Pinduoduo, is one example that Hopper identifies where game theory and actual games have led to significant numbers of repeat users. Rather than investing in paid search marketing (like the majority of Hopper’s major booking platform competitors), Hopper is exploring using its marketing resources to reward frequent users with discounts and other financial rewards.  

What a week it has been watching the horrible events unfold in Ukraine. Our thoughts and prayers go out to those in Ukraine or with family in Ukraine.  

Booking Holdings Fourth Quarter Earnings Call
(“Booking Holdings Inc. (BKNG) CEO Glenn Fogel on Q4 2021 Results - Earnings Call Transcript,” February 23, 2022 via Seeking Alpha)
As promised, for those of you interested, attached is the transcript from the recent Booking Holdings’ earnings call.

Effects of Recent Egencia Acquisition Start to Unfold at Amex GBT
(“Egencia Adds Amex GBT Negotiated Airfares to Booking Platform,” March 2, 2022 via Business Travel News - Top Stories)
Egencia has announced that discounted airfares previously available to customers through Amex GBT are now available to users of the Egencia platform. Just a friendly reminder that as distribution channels and platforms continue to evolve (through mergers, acquisitions, and other activity), one can never be certain where his or her inventory may appear.

This week’s Update includes two stories detailed Booking Holdings’ recent earnings release and a surprise story regarding Google’s hotel booking platform. Enjoy.

Google Shutters Book on Google
(“Book on Google for hotels to shut after low take-up,” February 25, 2022 via Phocus Wire)
Citing low usage by both suppliers and users, last week, Google announced that it was shutting down its “Book on Google” feature on May 25. The facilitated meta search platform (my phrase) allowed users to begin the booking process on Google (reservations and payment details) and then complete the booking on the supplier’s (hotelier or OTA) website. The announced changes should have no effect on Google’s hotel search products, including the free booking links implemented last year.

This week’s Update features stories detailing recent fourth quarter earnings releases by TripAdvisor, Airbnb, Marriott and Sabre. Enjoy.

HotelPlanner Cancels Planned Merger
(“HotelPlanner.com SPAC Merger Called Off,” February 14, 2022 via Business Travel News)
It seems like only yesterday when many of our clients were left speculating as to what might come out of the newly announced merger and IPO of group booking platform, HotelPlanner, discount booking platform, Reservations.com and SPAC Astrea Acquisition Corp. There is no need for further speculation as the three companies announced last week that they have called off the planned merger. In their statement announcing the cancelation, the three companies offered no details as to the reasons behind the decision. One could speculate that HotelPlanner’s and Reservation.com’s differing reputations in the market might have played a role.

This week’s Update leads with an important Data Privacy Update from Eva Novick, the newest member of our firm’s privacy and data security team. If you currently operate a loyalty program (or plan to introduce one soon), I encourage you to read her important update. Enjoy.

The Travel Industry’s Push on Climate May Have Legs
(“Hotelbeds lays out eco and social initiatives, joins Amazon Climate Pledge,” February 11, 2022 via Phocus Wire)
For some time now, we’ve all seen the many surveys of would be travelers (particularly, younger travelers) detailing the importance of the environment and climate change in today’s travel decisions. Our weekly Update has recently featured a number of stories about this trend, including the recent launch of online platforms offering travelers carbon neutral travel. Last week, Spain-based bedbank, Hotelbeds, released its annual Environmental, Social and Government Report in which Hotelbeds claims it has again (for the fourth year running) attained carbon neutral status  through a combination of carbon reductions and offsets. At the same time, Hotelbeds also announced that it has joined Amazon’s Climate Pledge, which features companies committed to eliminating their carbon emissions to zero by 2040. So what does this really mean? Will efforts like these mean enough to travelers to actually drive bookings or market share? With Hotelbeds feeling the heat from increased competition in its wholesale space (think Expedia EPS and soon, Priceline’s equivalent offering), Hotelbeds is “banking” on it.

This week’s Update features stories on Kayak, Hopper (again) and Shiji, and includes an important privacy update from California on loyalty programs.

Kayak and Cruise Critic Partner on Cruises
(“In new partnership, Kayak cruise searches will feed Cruise Critic,” February 4, 2022 via Travel Weekly)
Last week, Kayak (Booking Holdings) announced that it was expanding its cruise offering by partnering with Cruise Critic (TripAdvisor). Once implemented, the partnership will redirect users searching for cruises on Kayak to Cruise Critic where they can then review and book cruises through travel agencies or cruise suppliers.

To celebrate Data Privacy Day, on January 28, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced an investigative sweep of businesses offering loyalty programs in California. This should come as no surprise, as Attorney General Bonta highlighted loyalty programs as one of the areas of non-compliance his office addressed during the first year of California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) enforcement. In this sweep, the Attorney General’s office sent letters of non-compliance to businesses across different industries, including in the travel and food services industries. Those companies have 30 days to cure their non-compliance or will be subject to further enforcement action and penalties.