France sues hotel site Booking.Com

ECONOMY minister Arnaud Montebourg has filed a legal complaint against American hotel reservations website Booking.Com over what he claims are unfair business practices.

The formal complaint issued yesterday alleges that Booking.Com's contracts unfairly prevent hotels from offering room at prices lower than those shown on the website.

“This underscores the government's desire and ability to ensure that national rules are respected by companies operating in the digital sector,” the minister’s office said in a statement.

“The company has been assigned to appear before the Tribunal de Commerce de Paris by the Minister of Economy.”

Booking.com’s practices mean that hotels signed up to the site could not offer special prices to customers who contacted them directly, the statement said.

In November, the government said it was launching an investigation into the contracts of online hotel reservation sites Booking.Com and Expedia, both of which are based in the US.

Mr Montebourg has clashed with foreign companies seeking operating in France before. He made his opinion clear about the sale of SFR to Numericable; and last month, in the wake of GE’s bid for Alstom, he signed a decree that broadens the state's power to stop foreign takeovers in certain industries.

Nor is it the first time an online hotel reservation site has fallen foul of French law.

In 2011, Expedia was fined €427,000 after being found guilty of a series of “false price reductions”, “false prices for hotels” and “false information on hotel availability”.

Photo: Lysandre78 / Wikimedia Commons