August 9th, 2011
Cheap travel rates online cause legislative battle
In order to keep with the competition, some of the leading online travel booking companies such as Orbitz, Hotels and Expedia had been providing cheap travel rates to customers especially on bundled offers (which includes booking hotel rooms). However, this has caused a legislative battle between these companies and tourism-heavy counties in the State of Florida.
According to reports, a 12-11 decision by the House Finance and Tax Committee members means that the measure to prevent online travel companies from making additional tourism taxes payments on hotel rooms that they sell online won’t push through. However, the votes may be reversed at a future meeting.
Tourism-heavy counties such as Miami-Dade, Broward and Monroe, sued the aforementioned companies, stating that the former are withholding the local tourism taxes that they should remitted to the county where the hotels are located. The local governments contend that they lose nearly $30 million a year in tourism tax revenues.