On the eve of the American Hotel & Lodging Association's March 15-16 Legislation Action Summit in Washington, D.C., a coalition of intermediaries penned an open letter to the hotel industry, urging dialogue about hoped-for federal hotel-tax legislation and inviting AH&LA leaders to meet with the group during or after the conference.
Citing "acrimony in recent weeks" over efforts to legislate a national standard about hotel taxes, the letter -- sent by the American Society of Travel Agents, the Interactive Travel Services Association, the Business Travel Coalition, the U.S. Tour Operators Association and Hotel Electronic Distribution Network Association -- urged the sitdown so hotels and online travel agencies and travel management companies might work together to address any concerns about the legislation's "potential language."
As of Saturday morning, AH&LA hadn't responded to a press inquiry about the letter, but ITSA spokesman Andrew Weinstein says, "Their initial response was that they will share the letter with their hotel partners and approach them about meeting with us, but that it would be impossible to do so in the midst of their legislative summit."
With OTAs facing dozens of lawsuits by municipalities across the country seeking to get them to remit hotel taxes on the retail -- and not just the net -- rate, the differences between AH&LA and the coalition of intermediaries appear to be far broader than "potential language."
The AH&LA's position is that the OTAs seek a federal tax preference that would prohibit local jurisdictions from taxing anything beyond the merchant rate they get from hotels, and that "the legislation also discriminates against every lodging property in the country by specifically banning hotels from using the new tax category."
"Because lodging properties will continue to collect and remit all taxes due, TPIs (Third Party Intermediaries) will be able to use their federal tax preference to market a lower final cost because they will be shielded from charging the same amount of tax," the AH&LA states.
The issue will be one of the central themes of the AH&LA conference next week.
For its part, the coalition of intermediaries states in the letter that it does not "think municipalities should attempt to shift any additional tax burden to hotels and we will work with you to fight any such efforts aggressively."
Tnooz reported in early February that ITSA and AH&LA had been discussing terms for a meeting about the hotel-tax issue, but apparently that get-together never happened.
So now the intermediaries have gone public with an "Open Letter to Our Partners in the Hotel Industry."
Asked if the initiative to meet with AH&LA leaders next week, with its conference in full swing Monday and Tuesday, was a publicity stunt, ITSA spokesman Weinstein says:
"Not a stunt at all. Their leadership will all be in D.C. next week, so it's the perfect time logistically. (Their conference is only on Monday and Tuesday, so we could meet at any time before, during or after it.) We would be happy to work around their schedules, but it seems crazy to start a fight on the Hill before we even sit down to see if their concerns -- which seem mostly like wording issues -- can be resolved in a way that benefits the entire industry."
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Side Note: For ASTA, the open letter was signed by Paul Ruden, the travel agency group's senior vice president, legal and industry affairs. ASTA announced Friday that long-time CEO William Maloney resigned. The chief executives of the four other organizations signed the open letter on behalf of their respective groups.