Moroccan Hotels Urge Government Action Against Booking.com’s Monopoly and Fee Changes

"We would like to inform you that the members of our Federation have recently received an email from the booking.com reservation site obliging them to pay all commissions in foreign currency, whereas they were paid until now in constant dirhams. This unilateral decision by Booking has been explained by the change in the requirements of Bank Al-Maghrib, [...] making the tourist accommodation establishments bear, in addition, the cost of 10% for the withholding tax," can be read in the letter to which Challenge had access.

For Amal Karioun, the president of the National Federation of Travel Agencies of Morocco (FNAVM), "this letter came at the right time to denounce what is happening in this case. The abusive practices that unilaterally impose on the players to pay commissions in foreign currency. The Booking platform is acting illegally in Morocco today and is causing a lot of economic losses to local players." For this professional, this "illegal practice" of Booking is strangling national operators. "The Moroccan elite should be inspired by the Turkish model, which has faced the same problem and has taken a special provision formally prohibiting the Booking group from selling Turkish hotel rooms to citizens in Turkey," he explains.

The hotel professionals have asked the supervisory minister "to kindly intervene with the head of government and, if necessary, with the Minister of Economy and Finance, in order to have Booking reverse its decision and maintain payments in dirhams." The president of the FNAVM denounces for his part the progressive monopoly of the Booking platform in Morocco, while it does not pay any tax. According to the Russian anti-monopoly agency (FAS), the booking.com website was fined 14.9 million euros for "abusing its dominant position on the Russian market for online accommodation booking sites." Moroccan operators hope that their authorities will also take strong measures against Booking’s abuses.