A recent open letter to the U.S. Congress outlines the American Hotel & Lodging Association's wish list for legislation during the current lame-duck session, headlined by the organization's continued hope for national rate transparency rules.
During the summer, AHLA officials publicly called for such legislation, noting it would provide a more level playing field across the country and be easier for hoteliers to navigate than state-by-state legislation, following California's adoption of hotel-specific rate transparency rules.
"In a situation like this where you've got consumers across political boundaries booking hotels or considering booking through the internet, this is an event where the solution should be a federal solution," said Troy Flanagan, executive vice president of external government affairs and industry relations at the American Hotel & Lodging Association, at the Hotel Data Conference in August. "We've been pushing on that for several years, and we're getting pretty close."
In the letter to Congress, new AHLA President and CEO Rosanna Maietta writes that passage of the No Hidden Fees Act in the House of Representatives and the Hotel Fees Transparency Act in the Senate are key.
"The hotel industry prides itself on offering an array of amenities and services to ensure guests have what they want and need from their travel experience," she writes. "Transparency and guest satisfaction are at the core of the industry’s business model. It is critical that guests have the same expectation of fee transparency and disclosure wherever they shop for and book hotel rooms. Ensuring guests have all the necessary information up-front and any mandatory fees included in the price they see prior to booking their rooms is central to the hotel industry’s model and to consumer satisfaction."
The national legislation would ideally follow the model created in California, AHLA officials said.
Under the California model passed into law via two separate bills in late 2023, hoteliers are required to include all required costs in their rates when advertised, as opposed to presenting a base rate then showing a list of fees attached to it underneath at booking or check-in. The rules also apply to how hotels present prices at restaurants and in-room food and beverage, but are not applicable to stand-alone restaurants.
AHLA officials had previously expressed confidence the legislation would pass before the end of the year, and specifically noted it was most likely during the lame-duck session. The House is slated to be in session through Dec. 19 and the Senate is in session through Dec. 20.
Other AHLA legislative policies for the session include:
- The Hotels Act, which focusing on preventing human trafficking and encourages federal workers to stay at hotels with active anti-human trafficking programs.
- The Closing the Workforce Gap Act, which would expand the H-2B visa program by instituting a needs-based system instead of a 66,000-worker annual cap.
- The Red Tape Reduction Act, which is intended to create "a more level playing field between the hotel and lodging industry and alternative accommodations."
Maietta described the Red Tape Reduction at as "common-sense legislation [that] adjusts 1099-K reporting requirements to capture cumulative transactions exceeding $10,000 or more than 50 transactions."
"This compromise position avoids placing burdensome requirements on an overly broad group of taxpayers while also accounting for the substantial sums of unreported income within the short-term rental industry," she said.