The Subsequent Section of Travel Distribution Rekindles Pricing and Parity Debates | Foster Garvey PC

Happy Monday night from Seattle . . . Our weekly Online Travel Update for the week ending Friday, December 19, 2025, is under. This week’s Update includes a heavy focus of necessary authorized updates on native Chinese efforts to analyze the practices of OTAs, the FTC’s newly introduced investigation into Instacart and its alleged surveillance pricing practices and an necessary German courtroom choice which will have extensive ranging results throughout Europe on pending class actions in opposition to Booking.com. Enjoy.

• ChatGPT’s App Store Is Open for Business – Everyone’s Business. OpenAI introduced this previous week that it’s now permitting third get together builders to construct and record apps inside ChatGPT. Once authorised, the apps will likely be listed in ChatGPT’s App Directory. Users can summon these information apps by way of the ChatGPT instruments menu, by way of @mentions or when ChatGPT deems the app related to the present session. In principle, a single trip planning session may set off a number of journey apps – competing OTAs, suppliers, and many others. So a lot for ChatGPT’s preliminary pilot companions – Expedia and Booking.com – and let the battle for session relevance amongst competing apps on ChatGPT start.
• FTC Launches Investigation into Instacart Pricing Practices. It was simply two weeks in the past that we dedicated to exploring additional the observe of customized (or “surveillance”) pricing, its use in on-line transactions (particularly journey) and sure regulation. With the addition of customized pricing to our day by day information searches, my inbox is already being inundated with customized pricing tales and newly introduced rules. Instacart has featured prominently these previous two weeks as a research two weeks in the past claimed to exhibit the wide range in pricing amongst customers for a similar gadgets after which this week, possible in response to the introduced research, the FTC has reportedly despatched Instacart a civil investigation demand to analyze the web retailer’s pricing practices.
• German Court Allows Hoteliers’ Claims Against Booking.com To Proceed. In a ruling final week, a Berlin courtroom discovered that Booking.com’s use of fee parity provisions between January 2013 and January 2016 restricted German lodges’ skill to set aggressive costs in violation of EC competitors legal guidelines. According to the courtroom’s choice, the OTA’s use of each broad parity provisions and later, slim get together provisions, unlawfully constrained lodges’ pricing freedom. The ruling clears the way in which for practically 1,100 German lodges to proceed with competitors claims in opposition to the OTA. The Berlin courtroom’s choice follows an earlier 2024 choice by the European Court of Justice that discovered that Booking.com’s use of fee parity provisions violated competitors regulation throughout Europe. This newest choice may show fairly useful to different EU hoteliers and their pending class motion claims in opposition to Booking.com arising, partially, out of its use of the identical fee parity provisions.

Have an important week everybody, and Happy Holidays.

OpenAI Breaks Open ChatGPT App Submissions
December 18, 2025 by way of Skift
Any journey model can now submit apps and get listed in its new app retailer — which suggests Booking.com and Expedia, early movers in OpenAI’s app ecosystem, will quickly get new competitors to personal ChatGPT’s journey conversations. OpenAI is now letting exterior builders construct and record their very own …

China Guesthouse Complaints Over OTA Practices Spread Beyond Yunnan
December 18, 2025 by way of MLex
Complaints from China’s guesthouse sector about practices of on-line journey businesses are spreading past Yunnan, as a district-level affiliation within the japanese vacationer metropolis of Huangshan launches its personal evidence-gathering marketing campaign over alleged unfair platform guidelines.

Instacart Shares Drop on Report that FTC is Probing Company Over AI Pricing Tool
December 17, 2025 by way of CNBC
Shares of grocery supply service Instacart dropped about 7% in prolonged buying and selling on Wednesday, following a report that stated the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has begun an investigation into the corporate’s pricing practices. The FTC despatched a civil investigative demand to Instacart, Reuters reported, citing …

Berlin Court Ruling Paves Way for Hotel Compensation Claims Against Booking.com
December 17, 2025 by way of Hotel News Resource
Over 1,000 German lodges have been granted the fitting to hunt compensation from Booking.com for anticompetitive pricing practices, probably influencing related claims throughout Europe. The ruling underscores the impression of restrictive best-price clauses on resort pricing methods and market competitors, with broader implications for the web journey trade. A latest …

Trump Plans Bonfire of US State-Level AI Regulation
December 12, 2025 by way of Computer Weekly
US president Donald Trump has directed his administration to start work on establishing a nationwide synthetic intelligence (AI) regulation framework throughout the nation in an try and override what he described as cumbersome state-level authorized frameworks. The newest government order (EO) to emerge from the Oval Office, Ensuring a nationwide …