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22-01-2026, 02:06 PM
For a start, hotel operators/owners have never stopped complaining about the take rates (15%-25%) from OTAs. But to deserve that take rate, the OTA needs to provide value and the most obvious value accretion is to have the platform drive the incremental customer to the hotel, ie. demand that the hotel is unable to attract on its own. Other value added services can also come in the form of helping to hotel to accept all forms of payment (cards, e-wallets etc) or transcend barriers which include language and currency differences.
As AirBnB Brian Chesky has espoused - everything that Airbnb does, almost always go back to improving the host experience. So for Ctrip to disadvantage its suppliers (hotel operators/owners), it is surely a red flag. Is this another example of involution that has gone real bad?
China’s hotels allege predatory pricing, forced exclusivity in Trip.com antitrust probe
The company controls about 56 per cent of China’s online travel market, according to China Trading Desk, and has grown into the world’s largest booking site. Its dominance has helped fuel domestic tourism’s recovery – nearly five billion trips were logged in the first three quarters of 2025 – but operators say the benefits are being offset by falling room yields.
Trip.com categorises merchants into tiers with “Special Merchants” enjoying the most visibility and traffic, Yunnan Provincial Tourism’s He said. However, these top-tier merchants are typically prohibited from listing on rival platforms like Alibaba’s Fliggy, ByteDance’s Douyin or Meituan. Merchants who are not bound by these exclusive arrangements report being effectively compelled to offer the lowest prices on Trip.com’s online booking platform Ctrip, or risk facing a raft of measures like lowered search rankings.
One homestay operator who recently hosted a live-stream sales on rival platform Douyin was contacted by a Ctrip business manager, asking them to remove their listing from the competing platform, according to Yunnan homestay association’s He.
Wang Lin, who rents out 10 rooms at a single-property homestay in Shantou, in the southern Guangdong province, said Ctrip unilaterally lowered his room prices multiple times last year without notifying him. He learnt of the reductions only from customers. One cut slashed room prices by 66 per cent to 100 yuan (S$18.44). What infuriated Wang further: Ctrip continued to charge commission based on his original room prices. Complaints to Ctrip failed to halt the cuts or recover lost revenue. “These are the practices of a bully,” said Wang.
https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/interna...rust-probe
As AirBnB Brian Chesky has espoused - everything that Airbnb does, almost always go back to improving the host experience. So for Ctrip to disadvantage its suppliers (hotel operators/owners), it is surely a red flag. Is this another example of involution that has gone real bad?
China’s hotels allege predatory pricing, forced exclusivity in Trip.com antitrust probe
The company controls about 56 per cent of China’s online travel market, according to China Trading Desk, and has grown into the world’s largest booking site. Its dominance has helped fuel domestic tourism’s recovery – nearly five billion trips were logged in the first three quarters of 2025 – but operators say the benefits are being offset by falling room yields.
Trip.com categorises merchants into tiers with “Special Merchants” enjoying the most visibility and traffic, Yunnan Provincial Tourism’s He said. However, these top-tier merchants are typically prohibited from listing on rival platforms like Alibaba’s Fliggy, ByteDance’s Douyin or Meituan. Merchants who are not bound by these exclusive arrangements report being effectively compelled to offer the lowest prices on Trip.com’s online booking platform Ctrip, or risk facing a raft of measures like lowered search rankings.
One homestay operator who recently hosted a live-stream sales on rival platform Douyin was contacted by a Ctrip business manager, asking them to remove their listing from the competing platform, according to Yunnan homestay association’s He.
Wang Lin, who rents out 10 rooms at a single-property homestay in Shantou, in the southern Guangdong province, said Ctrip unilaterally lowered his room prices multiple times last year without notifying him. He learnt of the reductions only from customers. One cut slashed room prices by 66 per cent to 100 yuan (S$18.44). What infuriated Wang further: Ctrip continued to charge commission based on his original room prices. Complaints to Ctrip failed to halt the cuts or recover lost revenue. “These are the practices of a bully,” said Wang.
https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/interna...rust-probe
I am not a certified financial advisor and so nothing of what I say should be construed as financial advice. Please consult a certified financial advisor for advice instead.
