Travel portal Booking.com fined heavily in Russia

Russian authorities have fined the Netherlands-based Booking.com heavily for abusing its market dominance.

The platform, on which hotel rooms can be booked, has to pay 13 billion roubles (175 million dollars), the anti-monopoly authority announced in Moscow on Thursday.

It accused Booking.com of prohibiting Russian hotels and hostels from offering their services at lower prices on other platforms. Such measures restrict competition and hurt the interests of hotels, it said.

German courts have also dealt with the booking portal's terms and conditions in the past.

Last May, the Federal Court of Justice ruled that booking portals such as Booking.com may not prohibit their partner hotels from offering rooms at lower prices on their own websites.

Such a so-called "narrow" best-price clause impairs competition, but at the same time Booking.com is not necessarily dependent on it, it was argued.