Hotel merchants join the platform with capital and personnel, yet have no pricing autonomy, becoming lost in the "dominant" platform's traffic and rankings, reduced to "oppressed slaves."

Hotels across the nation have long suffered under Trip.com's dominance.

On September 17, Zhengzhou Market Supervision Bureau conducted administrative interviews with Trip.com's operating entity according to law.

A month earlier (August 5), Guizhou Provincial Market Supervision and Administration Bureau also interviewed five travel platform companies including Trip.com, Tongcheng, Douyin, Meituan, and Fliggy.

Behind the successive regulatory interviews lies merchants' anger toward Trip.com platform's "hegemony."

According to Bank of Communications International estimates, combined with Tongcheng's 13% market share, Trip.com Group's market share approaches 70%, far exceeding the 50% market dominance threshold.

For years, leveraging its monopolistic position in China's hotel and travel (OTA) market, Trip.com has continuously used technical means such as pricing assistants and related unfair terms to "exploit" hotel and travel merchants, leaving merchants "angry but afraid to speak out."

**01 The Sinister Weapon "Pricing Assistant"**

Zhengzhou Market Supervision Bureau pointed out that Trip.com has problems using service agreements, trading rules, and technical means to unreasonably restrict platform merchants' transactions and pricing; it required Trip.com to thoroughly rectify issues such as "forced activation and inability to exit," complete contract clause revisions and pricing tool optimization within specified deadlines, and establish sound long-term compliance mechanisms.

Guizhou Provincial Market Supervision Bureau addressed potential violations by Trip.com and other platform companies including implementing "choose one of two" policies, using technical means to interfere with merchant pricing, breaching contracts or raising prices after order confirmation, price fraud, and price manipulation, prohibiting illegal behaviors such as price fraud, price manipulation, price collusion, and abuse of market dominance.

Both interviews mentioned Trip.com's deprivation of merchants' autonomous pricing rights. Trip.com's main tool for depriving pricing rights is the "pricing assistant" that has been complained about countless times by merchants. Guizhou Provincial Market Supervision Bureau also directly pointed to Trip.com's multiple violations of consumer rights.

The "pricing assistant" is built into Trip.com's merchant backend, an intelligent pricing tool created by Trip.com for merchants. Relying on algorithm real-time analysis capabilities, it regularly scans prices of identical hotel products on other platforms, providing competitive price references and market demand predictions.

Once discovering a hotel's pricing is higher than other platforms, the pricing assistant immediately automatically reduces the hotel's base price through the system or enrolls the hotel product in promotional activities.

In practice, the pricing assistant has become Trip.com's "weapon" for competing with platforms like Meituan. Hotel merchants on Trip.com's platform find that Trip.com ignores their wishes and arbitrarily reduces prices, causing merchants to lose more with each sale.

The Black Cat Complaints platform shows that from November 10, 2022, to September 22, 2024, over nearly three years, there were 369 complaints involving the pricing assistant.

A hotel merchant that began selling on Trip.com in July 2024 stated that initially, they also joined Meituan and Douyin, maintaining consistent pricing across all platforms.

However, over the six-month period until late February 2024, without the merchant's knowledge, Trip.com automatically reduced room prices multiple times, causing most sold rooms to be loss-making. "Using third-party interests to maliciously compete with other platforms, depriving me of autonomous pricing rights and causing me actual losses of about 10,000 yuan," the merchant said on the Black Cat Complaints platform.

Another homestay merchant who joined Trip.com in September 2024 encountered similar situations. "Always secretly modifying and reducing my prices, forcing me to be tens of yuan lower than Meituan hotels before giving up. These unfair terms that damage merchants through malicious competition are lawless," the merchant expressed on the Black Cat Complaints platform.

"Trip.com arbitrarily changes merchant sales prices, requiring merchants to maintain prices lower than third-party platforms. If merchants disagree, they change the merchant status to non-bookable," a Trip.com merchant helplessly said on the Black Cat Complaints platform.

An e-sports hotel merchant in Changxing County, Huzhou City, had their store delisted for refusing Trip.com's forced price reduction.

As is well known, hotels' online selling prices differ from final prices due to platform commissions, traffic costs, and other promotional expenses.

For merchants, different pricing across platforms is normal. Merchants make rational choices based on customer flow, platform support policies, and commission rates - this is their autonomous pricing right.

For consumers, choosing which platform to book hotels depends on comprehensive judgment of each platform's service and pricing - this is their freedom of choice.

However, for platforms, commission rates differ across platforms. If Trip.com has higher commissions yet requires hotels to display prices no higher than other platforms, or even lower, this essentially uses market dominance to force low-price procurement.

This may already involve violations of the Anti-Monopoly Law.

The Anti-Monopoly Law clearly prohibits operators with market dominance from abusing their position, including selling goods at unfairly high prices or purchasing goods at unfairly low prices, and refusing or restricting transactions with counterparties without justification.

Some Trip.com partner merchants directly complained about its abuse of market dominance and implementation of "choose one of two" policies. The merchant pointed out that Trip.com uses its market advantage through tools like "low-price benchmarking" and "pricing assistant" to force merchants to keep Trip.com prices no higher than other channels (including hotel official websites and offline front desks). If merchants don't comply, it deducts integrity scores, limits traffic, or even delists rooms under the pretext of "price inversion," effectively forcing merchants to accept monopolistic pricing strategies.

Hotel pricing comprehensively considers costs including energy, rent, labor, and channel promotion. Trip.com's arbitrary changes may already involve infringement of hotels' autonomous pricing rights.

The Price Law stipulates that commodity and service prices, except those subject to government guidance or pricing, implement market-regulated prices set autonomously by operators. Operator pricing must follow principles of fairness, legality, and good faith, with pricing based primarily on production and operation costs and market supply and demand.

"After reducing prices, rooms can be sold, but selling one means losing on one," hotel merchants helplessly say.

**02 Building Monopolistic Position**

Trip.com relies on its absolute monopolistic position in China's hotel and travel market, established over nearly 26 years.

In 1999, Liang Jizhang, Ji Qi, Shen Nanpeng, and Fan Min jointly invested 2 million yuan to establish Trip.com. In 2003, Trip.com listed on NASDAQ, and returned to Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2021.

During this period, Trip.com built a platform empire covering the entire industry chain through investment, mergers, acquisitions, and strategic alliances, including accommodation booking, transportation ticketing, vacation products, and business travel management.

In the main accommodation market, Trip.com has achieved absolute monopolistic dominance.

In April 2014, Trip.com invested $200 million cash in Tongcheng, breaking the Tongcheng-eLong alliance, with Tongcheng paying eLong 30 million yuan in compensation. This helped Trip.com maintain its industry leadership. In May 2015, Trip.com acquired 37.6% of eLong shares for $400 million, becoming its largest shareholder.

Between 2014-2015, Trip.com participated in Tuniu's IPO funding through private placements and transactions, investing $50 million for approximately 4% equity.

On October 26, 2015, Trip.com and Qunar announced their merger, with Trip.com gaining 45% voting rights in Qunar, while Baidu, Qunar's major shareholder, obtained approximately 25% total voting rights in Trip.com's common stock.

In hotel-related sectors, Trip.com acquired Zhonghui Information, a hotel customer review data service provider, for 240 million yuan in 2014. Additionally, Trip.com holds stakes in multiple hotel brands including Tujia, Hanting, and Capital Tourism.

Thus, Trip.com, Tongcheng, eLong, Qunar, Zhixing, and Tuniu became "one family." According to iResearch data, by 2016, Trip.com combined with Qunar, Tongcheng, and eLong held nearly 80% of China's online accommodation market, far exceeding Meituan (16.2%).

According to Bank of Communications International calculations, in 2024 by GMV (Gross Merchandise Value), Trip.com held 56% GMV market share in the hotel and travel market, far exceeding Meituan (13%), Fliggy (8%), and Douyin (3%). Including Tongcheng's 13% market share, the "Trip.com Group" occupies nearly 70% of the OTA market.

Currently, Trip.com's business covers over 1.2 million international hotel resources across more than 200 countries and 750,000 hotel resources across over 600 domestic cities.

According to QuestMobile data, in May 2024, Trip.com and Qunar apps ranked first and second in domestic tourism service industry organic traffic.

This overwhelming market dominance grants Trip.com strong bargaining power and control.

Hotels are Trip.com's main profit source, primarily earning commissions by providing online booking services for partner hotels. Bank of Communications International views Trip.com's high gross margins as mainly sourced from "low-cost, high-commission" strategies.

"Trip.com's commission rates for hotels are generally high, typically 10%-20%, with some hotels exceeding 30% when combined with activities. This high-commission model further compresses hotel profit margins in intense price wars," Bank of Communications International noted.

Besides the pricing assistant technical means, Trip.com has many fee-charging measures.

Merchants report that once they stop recharging for traffic on Trip.com, order volumes decline.

According to regulations, after becoming Trip.com's Gold or Special merchants, hotels must not only meet disguised "choose one of two" requirements but also pay higher commissions. Currently, Trip.com commission rates are generally 12%-20%, Special merchants 15%-20%, with some scarce resources reaching 30%. Hotel display order is Special > Gold > Non-badged.

Badging doesn't guarantee traffic. Currently, Trip.com has many badged merchants, but badging without prominent display is useless, as consumers typically browse only two to three pages when searching hotels.

Hotel merchants complain that Trip.com requires becoming Gold merchants with prices 5% lower than Meituan, greatly compressing profit margins. However, after hotels comply with system requirements, a bizarre "personalized pricing" situation emerges, where Trip.com's own price adjustment mechanism causes different users to see different prices.

To achieve better rankings, merchants must recharge on Trip.com, purchasing "Pyramid" and "Ladder" traffic promotion products.

"Pyramid" is pay-per-click - Trip.com deducts points whenever consumers click into hotel detail pages. "Ladder" is a commission increase tool, with merchants able to adjust commission percentages in the backend. Currently, achieving effective results on Ladder requires at least 5%-10% commission increases.

Trip.com also has traffic promotion products like "Competition Circle" and "Homepage Search."

For example, through "Competition Circle," Hotel A pays Trip.com to mark Hotel B as a "competition circle" hotel. Then all Hotel B's potential customers who browse Hotel B and scroll down will automatically see Hotel A appear.

Shanghai Jin Jiang International Hotel Co., Ltd. CEO Mao Xiao recently stated that franchisees now realize that long-term binding to these major platforms makes them increasingly passive, like many food service merchants.

Black Cat Complaints platform shows over 140,000 complaints searching "Trip.com," including arbitrary deductions, unreasonable fees, and high handling charges.

CCTV commented that this is Trip.com "leveraging traffic to command merchants," using merchant profits to establish its own "low-price generous" persona.

**03 "Frantic Blood-Sucking"**

Through "exploiting" merchants, Trip.com's performance has continuously climbed in recent years, with remarkable profitability.

In 2023, the company quickly resumed normal operations, achieving revenue of 44.5 billion yuan, up 122% year-on-year; net profit attributable to shareholders of 9.9 billion yuan, up over 6 times year-on-year, earning back three years of previous losses in one year.

In 2024, Trip.com achieved full-year revenue of 53.3 billion yuan, up nearly 20% year-on-year, reaching a new high since listing; net profit of 17.067 billion yuan, up over 72% year-on-year.

In the first half of 2024, Trip.com achieved revenue of 28.7 billion yuan, up 21% year-on-year; operating profit of 7.665 billion yuan, up 27% year-on-year; net profit of 9.194 billion yuan, up 17% year-on-year, equivalent to daily net earnings of 50.54 million yuan in the first half. Accommodation business revenue reached 11.7 billion yuan, up 21.87% year-on-year.

Trip.com's gross margin has long remained stable around 80%. In 2022, 2023, and 2024, they were 77%, 82%, and 81% respectively. In Q2 2024, Trip.com's gross margin remained stable at 81%, while Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu, and JD.com had gross margins of 45%, 57%, 45%, and 15.89% respectively.

In 2019, Trip.com's total revenue was 35.7 billion yuan with net profit of 6.5 billion yuan, averaging 17.8 million yuan daily net earnings. Current profitability is 2.8 times pre-pandemic levels.

Trip.com earns "enormously," while partner merchants increasingly lose money with each sale.

On August 8, Beijing Statistics Bureau released major economic indicators for above-scale accommodation and catering industry legal entities from January to June 2024.

Data showed Beijing had 5,135 legal entities in this field, achieving operating revenue of 73.775 billion yuan, down 3.7% year-on-year; total profit of 247 million yuan, plummeting 67% year-on-year. By industry, 1,613 accommodation units saw operating revenue down 7.3% year-on-year, with total profit of only 59.8 million yuan, a 92.9% decline.

Trip.com's daily net profit approaches Beijing's entire accommodation industry's first-half total profit.

According to Ministry of Culture and Tourism data, 30,000 hotels closed over the past two years, with single-property hotels comprising over 95%. In 2024, national average room rates fell 6% year-on-year, with economy hotels down 2.1% and mid-scale down 5%.

Platform fees keep rising, positive review costs increase, plus "pricing assistant" constantly pressuring prices - hotel profit margins are continuously compressed.

Many hotels resort to desperate measures, reducing staff-to-room ratios, hiring part-time workers, and cutting material waste for cost reduction and efficiency improvement. The result is declining consumer experience.

On September 20, a guest posted questioning whether white slippers at a Marriott hotel in Changzhou, Jiangsu were being reused. On September 21, the hotel said that for environmental reasons, slippers are disinfected, cleaned, and recycled 2-3 times.

Facing dual pressure from regulation and industry crisis, Trip.com has made symbolic adjustments. On September 11, Trip.com Vice President Xiao Yuan announced two "anti-involution" measures: restructuring hotel review systems, unbinding "scores and traffic," and optimizing recommendation logic to escape the "low-price, low-quality" trap.

Looking closely at this statement, Trip.com's inherent "traffic hegemony" and "platform hegemony" thinking hasn't truly changed.

The dominant platform is the originator of hotel involution. Only when monopolistic platforms contract their boundaries, return to intermediary roles, and stop acting as profitable referees can hotels return to healthy competition tracks, focusing on improving products and services to win consumers rather than becoming "oppressed slaves" of platforms.