The gatekeeper on trial: what the Booking.com collective action means for direct bookings
Opinion: why hotels should win — and why it isn’t enough
TL;DR — On 30 October 2026, 18,135 European hotels completed their filing in a collective action against Booking Holdings over price parity clauses used from 2004 to 2024. I hope they win, and I hope Booking pays. But compensation will take years, and it won’t return the direct demand hotels lost — that has to be won back now, on Search, Maps and AI.
Where I stand
I’ll be clear from the start: I support this claim, and I hope the court orders Booking Holdings to compensate the hotels.
Booking.com is not just another sales channel. The European Commission designated it a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act in May 2024. In Spain, the competition authority found it held 70–90% of the market for online hotel booking services. When a company with that position tells hotels they may not sell cheaper on their own website, it isn’t negotiating. It is setting the rules of the market.
For two decades, those rules decided what a hotel could charge on its own website. In my view, the hotels that lived under them deserve to be compensated, and the practices behind them deserve close scrutiny so they never come back in another form.
Booking disagrees. It calls the claims “incorrect and misleading” and argues its parity clauses had no anti-competitive effect. That’s for the court to decide. What follows is why I think the hotels have the stronger case — and why winning in court still won’t be enough.
What the claim is about
The Stichting Hotel Claims Alliance (SHCA), a Dutch non-profit foundation, filed its third and final group of claimants before the Amsterdam District Court on 30 October 2026. The numbers tell the story of a sector that has run out of patience:
- January 2026: 3,087 hotels when proceedings began
- July 2026: 10,783 hotels
- October 2026: 18,135 hotels — up 68% in three months
The claim centres on price parity clauses in Booking.com’s terms between 2004 and 2024. Until 2015, “wide” clauses stopped hotels offering lower prices on any other channel. From 2015, “narrow” clauses still stopped them offering lower prices on their own website. SHCA estimates total damages could reach several billion euros, plus interest.
Why Amsterdam? Because Booking.com’s own terms give Dutch courts exclusive jurisdiction over disputes with hotels. The action is backed by HOTREC, the European hospitality association, and more than 30 national associations. A first hearing is expected in 2027.
Not the first ruling: a pattern across Europe
This claim doesn’t come out of nowhere. Courts and regulators in several countries have already ruled against Booking’s parity clauses:
| Date | Decision |
|---|---|
| 4 Mar 2026 | Amsterdam District Court (interim ruling, German hotels’ case): parity clauses are not neutral ancillary restraints; Booking’s time-bar defence rejected (IHA) |
| 16 Dec 2025 | Berlin Regional Court II: Booking liable to compensate 1,099 accommodation operators for damage from its best-price clauses. Not yet final (court) |
| 14 Nov 2024 | Digital Markets Act obligations apply: Booking may not impose parity of any kind (European Commission) |
| 19 Sep 2024 | Court of Justice of the EU (C-264/23): wide and narrow parity clauses cannot be treated as ancillary restraints; narrow clauses “do not appear to be objectively necessary” (CJEU) |
| 30 Jul 2024 | CNMC, Spain: €413.24m fine for abuse of dominance, including narrow parity and using booking volume as a ranking factor (CNMC) |
| 13 May 2024 | European Commission designates Booking Holdings a gatekeeper |
| 2021 | Germany’s Federal Court of Justice upholds the Bundeskartellamt’s ban on narrow parity clauses |
Booking is appealing or contesting several of these decisions. But the direction is hard to miss: the more closely the courts look, the weaker the case for parity becomes.
How parity cost hotels
The damage wasn’t only the commission. It was what parity did to the guest’s decision.
- A guest searches for your hotel by name. They already want you.
- They see the same price on Booking.com and on your website.
- With no price reason to book direct, they pick the familiar checkout, the stored card, the loyalty points.
- You pay commission on demand your brand, your reviews and your location created.
Repeat that across millions of brand searches and twenty years, and you get a market where the OTA becomes the default path to book. In my view, that’s how parity helped build the dominance competition authorities later described. Hotels didn’t just lose margin. They lost the habit of guests booking direct — and that is much harder to win back than money.
Parity is banned. Watch what replaces it
Booking removed parity from its contracts for the EEA in 2024. Under the DMA, that’s not optional. The law bans parity requirements of any kind — including other measures with the same effect.
That last part matters. Parity doesn’t need a contract clause to work. Any lever that rewards hotels for matching OTA prices, or punishes them for undercutting, can have the same effect. The European Commission’s own factsheet shows how long that took to close: until September 2026, Booking still used hotels’ prices on other channels to decide eligibility for Booking Sponsored Benefit. It also only recently removed the “competitive / non-competitive” labels from its price scans in the Extranet.
If any company tried to recreate parity through the back door, that would itself breach the DMA. These are the levers I’d monitor:
| Lever | What to watch for |
|---|---|
| Search ranking | Visibility drops after you lower direct prices |
| Genius, Preferred, Preferred Plus | Eligibility or performance scores that shift with your direct rates |
| Booking Sponsored Benefit | Booking-funded discounts that make your listing cheaper than your own website |
| Price scans and partner messages | Any nudge, label or call suggesting you “align” prices |
| Commission and programme terms | Better terms tied to price matching |
If you see any of these, document it (dates, screenshots, rates) and share it with your national hotel association or competition authority. Hotels watching closely is how the DMA works in practice.
Why winning in court isn’t enough
Say the hotels win. The first hearing is expected in 2027, appeals can follow, and payouts may take years. Meanwhile, the guest who searches for your hotel tonight still has to choose where to book.
The end of parity gives hotels something they didn’t have for twenty years: the freedom to make the official website the best place to book. But price freedom only pays if guests find that website. Today, guests discover hotels on three surfaces:
- Search: your hotel’s name on Google. Is the official site the first result, or an OTA? Are Google’s free booking links and metasearch showing your direct rate?
- Maps: your Google Business Profile. Does the “Book” button lead to your booking engine? Are your rates, photos and services complete and current?
- AI assistants: ChatGPT, Gemini and Google’s AI Mode. When a guest asks “best boutique hotel in Palma with a rooftop”, does the answer name you — and link to your site?
That third surface is where the next gatekeeper fight is happening. Dr. Volker Soyez, who leads the SHCA claim, put it plainly: “As AI reshapes travel and offers guests new ways to find accommodation, losing the goodwill of hotels could pose a major risk to Booking Holdings’ business.” The reverse is also true: AI is an opportunity for hotels to be found without an intermediary — but only if they show up in the answers.
AI assistants build answers from entity data, reviews, structured content and trusted sources. A hotel with a clear, consistent and well-structured presence gets recommended. A hotel that leaves it to the OTAs gets an OTA link next to its name.
A 90-day checklist for hotels
Each action ties to a number that shows up in revenue, not in a traffic report.
| # | Action | KPI to track |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Audit your brand search results in your top source markets: who ranks, who bids on your name | Direct share of branded clicks |
| 2 | Activate Google free booking links and metasearch with your direct rate | Direct bookings from Google Hotels |
| 3 | Make the direct advantage visible: best rate, perks, flexible terms, on site and on your Google Business Profile | Booking engine conversion rate |
| 4 | Complete and update your Google Business Profile: booking link, services, photos, reviews | Bookings from GBP |
| 5 | Add hotel structured data (schema) and consistent property facts across your site | AI answers citing your official site |
| 6 | Track 20–30 real guest prompts in ChatGPT, Gemini and AI Mode | Share of AI answers naming your hotel |
| 7 | Measure revenue by landing page in GA4 and your booking engine | Direct revenue, commission saved |
| 8 | Log any OTA ranking or programme changes after you change direct prices | Evidence for your association |
The bottom line
I hope the 18,135 hotels win. Fair competition and the freedom to set your own prices should never have been up for negotiation. And regulators should stay alert, so that what courts are taking apart doesn’t come back under a different name.
But the court will decide the past. Your direct share for next season is a decision you make this quarter.
Full disclosure: I run Penycate, a consultancy that helps hotels grow direct bookings across Search, Maps and AI. If you want to know how visible your official website really is — and what it’s costing you in commission — get in touch.
FAQ
Why are hotels suing Booking.com? They seek compensation for financial harm from price parity clauses Booking.com used from 2004 to 2024, which restricted hotels from offering lower prices on other channels, including their own websites.
How many hotels are part of the claim? 18,135 hotels, after the third and final group was filed on 30 October 2026 at the Amsterdam District Court.
Can my hotel still join? The October filing was the final group. Check mybookingclaim.com or your national hotel association for any other options.
Can hotels now offer lower prices than on Booking.com? Yes, in the EEA. Under the Digital Markets Act, Booking.com may not impose price parity of any kind, including through measures with the same effect.
What is a gatekeeper? A large platform the European Commission designates under the Digital Markets Act. Booking Holdings was designated in May 2024 and must follow specific rules, including the parity ban.
When will there be a decision? A first hearing is expected in 2027. A final outcome, including any appeals, may take several years.
