Travel corporations are going through a shift from what has been a evenly regulated surroundings to a extra regulated, consumer-friendly regime.
The Package Travel Directive in Europe and related U.Ok. laws, for instance, have coated journey components bundled collectively for a few years. But shifts in how journey is offered have pushed legislators in Europe and the U.Ok. to rethink.
The guidelines are increasing to cowl single journey providers purchased inside a 24-hour window, affecting journey suppliers with web sites which have issues like completely different tabs for flights, accommodations and automotive rent.
Rhys Griffiths, the journey lead at regulation agency Fox Williams, described the change as “quite significant,” probably requiring corporations to acquire licenses from regulators and put insolvency safety schemes in place.
“It’s the most stringent piece of travel regulation that we have,” stated Griffiths. “And by expanding the footprint, bringing a bunch of other companies within it, it’s just going to mean many more restrictions on the way that companies can operate.”
He spoke concerning the significance of planning for regulation adjustments affecting the sector in an interview within the PhocusWire studio at The Phocuswright Conference.
Griffiths went on to debate the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, which mandates reporting on environmental, social and governance. He highlighted examples the place journey corporations would possibly must report on local weather change impacting enterprise.
“In Europe in recent years, we’ve had certain countries being extremely extremely hot during the summer. There’s been lots of speculation about whether that’s going to change customer behavior, whether they’re going to travel to those southern European countries. That’s a risk to OTAs brought around by climate change. So that may be an example of something which will need to be reported on.”
And the penalties for noncompliance could possibly be steep, he stated, as legislators have tended in direction of turnover-based fines lately.
Griffiths additionally mentioned different methods regulators are cracking down on journey corporations, together with via the Digital Services Act, which goals to control content material on websites, equivalent to unlawful listings.
The compound impact of the present regulatory panorama is that the foundations will apply to many extra journey corporations, they usually might not even notice it.
See under for the complete interview with PhocusWire’s Linda Fox.
The Phocuswright Conference 2025: Regulations on the radar for the journey trade