"I originally wanted to book a better hotel, so I chose a five-star hotel on an OTA platform (online travel platform). When I saw a suitable price, I booked it. It was only after I arrived that I found the hotel’s environment was very poor, and only after checking did I know that it was the platform’s own evaluation ‘ Wuzuan Hotel ’ , not a five-star hotel. The platform puts its own ‘ Wuzuan Hotel ’ Confused with five-star hotels, it is really hard to prevent! " Recently, Ms. Wang, a Shanghai consumer, spoke about her recent experience in booking a hotel.
Booking hotels through OTA platform has become the first choice of many people, but the star-rated hotels selected on OTA platform may be tricky. In the interview, the reporter found that some OTA platforms marked non-five-star hotels with words such as "Five Diamond Hotel" and "Golden Diamond Hotel", giving people a high-quality feeling, so as to attract consumers to book. However, some consumers were disappointed after booking the so-called "Five Diamond Hotel".
It is reported that five-star hotels are evaluated by the National Tourism Star Hotel Evaluation Committee, and the evaluation criteria are very strict, with 84 hard indicators. Four-star hotels are evaluated by the Provincial Tourism Star Hotel Evaluation Committee, and three-star hotels and below are evaluated by the Municipal Tourism Star Hotel Evaluation Committee.
So, how is the drill hotel on OTA platform evaluated? An OTA platform has responded that at present, there are more than 400,000 hotels in China, but there are less than 10,000 listed star-rated hotels. More than 97% of hotels cannot let users know the rating information as a reference. To this end, the platform launched the hotel drill-level system, mainly considering factors such as hotel comprehensive facilities and equipment, customer check-in comments, and referring to the listing standards of star-rated hotels, and selecting the drill-level hotels.
However, some consumers pointed out that on some OTA platforms, there is no obvious difference between star hotels and self-rated diamond hotels. On September 15th, the reporter found in a platform that after clicking the "Select Price/Star" button, options such as "Four Stars (Diamond)" and "Five Stars (Diamond)" appeared, that is to say, star hotels and diamond hotels are sold together. In addition, on the hotel booking page, the logo of a five-star hotel is five yellow stars, while the logo of "Five Diamond Hotel" is five yellow diamonds. If consumers don’t observe carefully, they are easily misled.
On the black cat complaint platform, there are also many consumers who question that the rating of the diamond hotel on the OTA platform is inconsistent with the hotel’s facilities and service level, and question that the platform sells non-star hotels at high prices.
In this regard, Chen Yinjiang, Deputy Secretary-General of china law society Consumer Protection Law Research Association, pointed out that hotel reservation by consumers is mainly based on comprehensive factors such as hotel star rating, price, environment and convenient transportation. According to consumers’ cognition, hotel star rating (drilling level) should be equal to hotel facilities and service level. If there is a big gap, then the so-called diamond hotel is not worthy of its name, and it is suspected of false propaganda and misleading consumption.
"Therefore, on the one hand, the platform should strictly standardize the evaluation criteria of the drilling hotel to make it worthy of the name; On the other hand, drill-level hotels should be strictly distinguished from star-rated hotels, and consumers should be clearly reminded to safeguard consumers’ right to know. " Chen Yinjiang said.