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Another Higher Commission Tactic

This last week an email was received from Booking.com, indicating that as a result of a change in South African tax legislation, they will be increasing the Commission charged on all bookings. The tax legislation they refer to has been in place for about 30 years in South Africa. The move effectively pushes commission up by 2.25%, which adds further to the situation which already sees Booking.com charging a higher commission than any other OTA. It is a move to further push small hospitality establishments out of the market.


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Aaltje B. 5 years ago

It looks like it Lyn...Not sure what the thought behind the decision is. I am not happy about it either.

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

It is again an example of them believing we are dependent on them for business. They do access guests for us & that's great. However without the hospitality businesses, they would not be in business. They never suggest reducing their commission to assist you in getting guests and yet they make suggestions for you to provide a discount to get more guests. It is only when they reduce commissions that I will believe they are truly interested in promoting your business.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

Hi Lyn,

What's your performance with Booking? Do you get majority of the guests from them?

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pibomarco 5 years ago

I can say, that I am dependent on BDC. I was suspended for few months from their platform and that was when I realised that I need them more then they need me. Perhaps you should blame you country first? ;)

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

They are actually the last ones :) Google ads first ;)

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

I also dont like paying so much commission but....

Unfortunately, I agree with pibomarco. Advertising our properties through Booking, really brings guests to us.

Cheers!!!

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

Katerinka, yes I do. I first listed my property in Airbnb but I have more reservations through Booking.com, almost double.

This year so far I have only reservations from Booking....

No reservations from Airbnb I dont understand why...

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

There are several comments above. We get less than 10% of our booings from Booking.com and although we appreciate any bookings we get as it fills in the gaps, we are not dependent on BDC to survive. We market our business extensively. We are listed with AirBnB & don't get a great deal from them but the commission rate with them is considerably less. We certainly don't blame a country for this increase as the tax legislation they make referewnce to is almost 30 years old.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

M, Airbnb propritizes new listings, they market them better (send emails and options for discounts), they put them higher in search. For that reason you can create second ad, since you have several rooms?

Some say also that updating listing also helps and being logged in to the site all the time.

Also, may be it's just me, but not so clear what exact room the guest will be staying?

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pibomarco 5 years ago

"but the commission rate with them is considerably less"
Basicly it's the "same", because AirBnB charges the guest at least 12% or higher for their service. That is why we pay less (cca 3% commission). To have a competitive offer on AirBnB, you basicly have to lower your rates, because the guest would then pay less if they book over BDC instead of AirBnB.

Now they offered the similar model option as to other OTA's. For example: (The service fee, which the host has decided to pay, helps us run our platform and offer services like 24/7 support on your trip.), which is about in total 15%,

M do you have instant book ON? Or the guest must send a request before confirming?
Competitive rates + instant book = better ranking.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

"we are not dependent on BDC to survive" many would say it. How do you "market your business extensively"?

Well, no matter how would you look at it, if you need to market your property, then you will end up paying 3rd party, whether it's an OTA, local agent or advertiser.

It's a big question, what is better - higher commission and more bookings, or lower commission and less bookings.

And no one, no one can beat Airbnb in bringing very special people with that very special views in life, that someone has to pay for their multiple desires.

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

The saying goes - "Time is money" - and so for the most part, that is our cost. We are registered with several OTAs all on a commission basis but the commissions are generally lower. We have a website & we promote that extensively, most of which doesn't incur a cost. There is some cost to that including a hosting fee plus the cost of building the website. We do pay for Google pay-per-click but the commission amount with BDC still remains an issue. As we only get a limited number of bookings from BDC, so generally the actual amount paid is not huge. But our time does cost & this should be factored in.

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pibomarco 5 years ago

That's interesting, which OTAs are those where commissions are lower? Basicly I am not aware of OTA that takes less then 15%. AirBnB is not an example.. Because if you set the room rate 100€ on both platforms , the guest will pay 100€ via BDC and 112€ on AirBnB.
So your BDC commission amount is 17,25%?

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

Yes, but some of the other OTAs include the VAT amount in their 15% and also process the full transaction so you get an amount excluding the commission deposited directly into bank account - a very simple process. With BDC, we will receive only Credit Card details which you have to find, & process it and we pay effectively an extra 2.3% commission to the Credit Card company, making the commission in real terms 19.55%. And then there is a good chance the CC details are invalid/fraudulent which creates additional work to sort out, plus possibly losing out on bookings while this done.

In terms of the AirBnB story, it is helpful to know that they effectively charge the guest the commission. This was never made clear to us when we registerd with them.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

In addition to commission, Airbnb charges penalty for cancelation. For me it's 100 dollars. Not that bad for the stranger, who never stayed or created drama to stay for free and left bad review.

BDC also values their time. Thus the commission.

"But our time does cost & this should be factored in." So, you can add some money for your time in your website rate..

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

Besides the behavior of Airbnb is unpredictable and full of lies. They treat host with few reviews and host with many reviews absolutely different, thinking that you will be "scared" to loose such valueble account and you have a lot of money to pay for scammers.

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

This may become a AirBnB versus BDC debate. We do not get many AirBnB bookings but we like the feature of being able to review the guests & we've had no issues with anyone from AirBnB. We have however had some issues with the BDC Customer Care Centre. But this is not the issue under discusion here.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

Did you try Payments by Booking? In that case you don't need to pay additional fees to credit card company and deal with any fraudulent cards.

What's the issue under discussion here? Another Higher Commission "Tactic" is not a tactic, but respecting the laws of your country, which are mandatory even if they were created 100 years ago...

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Lyn Morgan 5 years ago

Maybe I am missing something here. Why have they not respected the law up to this point? An explanation may be that previously they paid the VAT from the commission charged. That is to say it was 15% [VAT inclusive], and now they have made it 15% [VAT exclusive]. This may well pose a legal problem for BDC. In our country, the law is that if a price doesn't specifically indicate it is VAT exclusive, it is presumed to be VAT inclusive. Despite the claims by BDC, the VAT legislation has not changed according to accountants consulted.