Court orders preventive suspension of Booking.com activities in Turkey

ISTANBUL

An Istanbul court on March 29 ordered the suspension of the activities of Booking.com, the Netherlands-based travel fare aggregator website, in Turkey in a bid to prevent unfair competition.The Istanbul 5th Court of First Instance ordered the suspension of Booking.com to market and mediate stationed hotel and accommodation facilities in Turkey on its own website and on other addresses in a lawsuit filed by the Association of Turkish Travel Agencies (TURSAB) to prevent unfair competition.The access ban by the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) on Booking.com is expected to go into effect following the court’s declaration to the authority.Meanwhile, TURSAB Secretary General Çetin Gürcün told daily Hürriyet that people who have previously made reservations through the website would not face any problems regarding the court ruling.The Booking.com BV companies had also paid an administrative pecuniary penalty of around 2.5 million Turkish Liras to the competition authority due to their previous activities that breached competition rules, as part of a previous application from TURSAB.