Duff on Hospitality Law

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. 

This week’s OTA and Travel Distribution Update for the week ending December 16, 2016 is below. This week’s Update contains an update on one important recent court decision involving OTAs.

California Supreme Court Issues a Potentially Troubling Opinion [OTA / Tax]. Although I don’t often comment on the multitude of OTA tax decisions issued across the country, I felt that the recent California Supreme Court decision finding (once again) in favor of OTAs warranted some discussion. Although the California Court, like so many courts before it, based its decision on the rather uncontroversial conclusion that the OTAs were not “Operators” (the party expressly obligated to collect the occupancy tax under the applicable San Diego Municipal Code) of the subject hotels, language found elsewhere in the decision caught our attention.

November 2016 held more than one shock for many in America. Not only did the presidential election cycle come to a dramatic close, but the government introduced its new Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification.

First introduced in 1986, the “Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification,” must be completed for every new employee. Over time, it has been expanded from one page to two. And its instructions have grown from less than a page, to six pages for the 2013 edition to 15 pages of Instructions – more than four for the employee section alone – for the 2016 edition in English and in Spanish.