Marriott Homes & Villas Mandates a Rate Rule That Europe Considers Anticompetitive
Photo Credit: A villa in Gevelsberg, Germany as seen on December 20, 2020. Marriott Homes & Villas requires property managers to agree to price parity provisions. Flickr.com / Wolfgang
Skift Take
With the competition heating up among short-term rental platforms, price parity issues may increasingly come into play, as they once did in the hotel industry. But with short-term rentals, given the ever-shifting guest fee rates, the pricing rules will be difficult to enforce.
The standard contract for Marriott's Homes & Villas business requires property managers to adhere to "price parity" rules, Skift has learned, and these are the same sorts of provisions that European authorities view as anticompetitive in the hotel industry.
To be clear, Marriott does not mandate these rate rules where they are "prohibited by applicable law," according to the contract obtained by Skift. European Union countries have taken a much tougher stance on competition law in the online travel and hotel industry than their North American counterparts, barring Booking.com and Expedia from demanding rate parity for hotel offerings on rivals' websites.
But the inclusion of an "inventory and price parity" clause in the Homes & Villas contract, as well as reports that Airbnb account managers pressure short-term rental hosts and managers to lower rates or face the penalty of seeing their listings fall in search results, suggests that such rate parity rules are creeping int
