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UK: Watchdog cracks down on hotel booking sites

By  |  June 28, 2018

Hotel booking sites must review the way they rank and display rooms, the UK’s competition watchdog has said. Some sites may be making misleading claims about discounts, the Competition and Markets Authority said.

The Competition and Markets Authority has been investigating whether sites are misleading consumers since October and identified a number of areas of concern.

The CMA did not name the companies it was investigating, but leading sites include Expedia and Booking.com.

The regulator is examining the extent to which a hotel’s ranking on a website may be influenced by the size of its commission.

The CMA said details on the sites about how many people are looking at a room, how many are left and how long a price is available can create a false impression of availability or rush customers into making a booking decision.

Full Content: The Guardian, BBC News

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