French Travel Platform

2020: Creation of the platform

On May 14, 2020 it became known that the government of France together with the French tourism industry creates French Travel Platform service which will compete with Airbnb and Booking.com. Money for this project is selected from the budget of the country.

This initiative will become a part of the stimulating package of measures of the government for tourism revival. France — one of the most popular destinations in the world. However owing to a coronavirus pandemic the industry is in deep decline.

France creates the competitor of Airbnb and Booking

As Eric Lombard told, the head of the public financial institution Caisse des Depots & Consignations, the American online companies took the tourist industry of France, having occupied a mediator role between players of the market and travelers.

We need to return direct link with clients — he said.

According to the Pawnshop, the platform is created from scratch only for the benefit of the tourist industry of France. It added that many months will be required to create high-quality service, without having specified when the work on the website is going to be completed.

The stimulating package of measures for support of tourism industry was announced on May 14, 2020 by the French Prime Minister Edoir Philipp. In total the state is going to spend for it 18 billion euros. In addition, support will include direct payments to the most affected parties from the general fund in 1.3 billion euros. Payments will also receive the companies which staff includes more than 20 employees.

In 2019 the users of Airbnb service in France leased housing for the total amount more than $2 billion. What became the second indicator after the USA. The French regulators demanded from the company data on income gained by users to compare them to income which they specified in declarations and to identify unfair taxpayers.^[1]

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