The Ministry of Culture and Tourism has proposed new regulations: "Big data killing" may result in a fine of up to 500,000 yuan

The National Day Golden Week has just passed, and many tourists buy tickets and book hotels through online travel platforms. However, while online platforms provide convenience to people, they have also been criticized for phenomena such as false bookings, unreasonable low-price tours, and "big data killing familiarity". In response, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued the "Interim Regulations on the Management of Online Tourism Business Services (Draft for Comments)" (hereinafter referred to as the "Interim Regulations"), preparing to further regulate online tourism business activities.

OTA platforms have become the hardest hit area by "killing familiarity"

Killing familiarity means that the price seen by old customers is much more expensive than that by new customers for the same goods or services.

It is worth noting that in the past two years, many Internet platforms including Didi Chuxing, Ctrip, Fliggy, JD.com, Meituan, Taopiaopiao, etc. have been exposed to suspected "killing" situations, covering online In many fields such as business travel, online ticketing, online shopping, and transportation, OTA (Online Travel Agent) online travel platform is particularly prominent. Most of the above-mentioned platforms deny this.

On October 7, 2018, the well-known writer Wang Xiaoshan criticized Fliggy Travel App on Weibo for using big data to "kill people". Fliggy responded: It has never and will never use big data to harm the interests of consumers.

Industry leader Ctrip was also accused by users of "big data manipulation". On the evening of March 10, Weibo netizen @陈利人 broke the news that when Ctrip booked a ticket but failed to pay, he found that he forgot to check the "reimbursement voucher" and when he returned it for correction and then paid, he was reminded that "there is no ticket." I searched for the ticket again and found that the price was nearly 1,500 yuan more expensive. When purchasing the ticket through the HNA APP, the price was 2,100 yuan lower than the price offered by Ctrip for the first time.

On March 11, Ctrip issued an apology stating that Ctrip had never engaged in any "big data killing" behavior. A review of the orders mentioned in the news revealed that the new version released on February 26 was There is a bug in the flight booking process and we apologize for it. According to preliminary statistics, the bug affected about 1,300 people and involved about 100 transaction orders. As of 11pm on the 10th, the bug has been fixed and we will contact customers one by one to bear the losses caused by users.

Three ways to “kill familiarity with big data”

Ma Shuzhong, director of the China Cross-border E-Commerce Research Institute at Zhejiang University, summarized the three ways to “kill familiarity”:

First, use big data to conduct “user profiling”. According to the user's income level and consumption habits, some products are pushed to users in a targeted manner, while other products are hidden to induce users' consumption choices and increase prices to a certain extent to achieve "killing familiarity".

The second is to achieve “familiarity” through geographical location information. The merchant collects the user's geographical location information through the mobile application background and conducts real-time analysis. If there are few potential competitors near the user's location, the merchant will increase the price to a certain extent.

The third is to achieve "familiarity" through the behavioral details of users' interaction with mobile applications. The behavioral details of the user's interaction with the application, such as the frequency of typing information, search keywords, etc., can to a certain extent reflect the urgency of the user's demand for goods or services at this point in time. Some merchants will make dynamic floating price increases based on this information.

Why "kill the cooked" instead of "kill the living"?

Luo Pinliang, a professor at the Department of Industrial Economics, School of Management, Fudan University, pointed out that first of all, regular customers are often "self-righteous" and think that if they are familiar with the merchant, they will get better services and more preferential prices. Unexpectedly, regular customers often have to " Self-righteousness” pays the price. Secondly, the behavior of regular customers is relatively fixed and they are tired of “shopping around”, so they have to pay a higher price for their “inertia” or “stickiness”. Finally, regular customers tend to have higher switching costs and thus pay for the “lock-in effect.” All in all, compared to new customers, regular customers are less sensitive to price, that is, the price elasticity is relatively low. Therefore, "killing familiarity" is essentially a price discrimination strategy.

Industry supervision is difficult, and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism has taken action to rectify it

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism pointed out that online tourism companies and platforms are not only the service entities of the offline tourism industry, but also the mainstay of online e-commerce platforms. The operator has a dual identity. At present, relevant domestic laws and regulations have not clearly defined the norms of the online travel market, which makes industry supervision more difficult. Judging from the reports and complaints received by local cultural and tourism administrative departments, as well as the problems reflected in relevant media reports, the problems involved by the above-mentioned companies and platforms mainly focus on "tourism safety and rescue obligations, consumer rights protection, false "Propaganda" and other important aspects of industry development urgently need to be regulated through sound laws and regulations.

The "Interim Provisions" respond to hot social issues. Specific regulations have been made on issues such as false bookings, unreasonable low-price tours, price discrimination (big data killing), credit supervision and other issues.

/ What you know /

How do consumers protect their rights when encountering "rip-off"?

When consumers encounter the problem of "price discrimination", how can they tell whether they are being "killed"? How to safeguard rights?

Meng Huixin, assistant analyst of the Legal Rights Department of the E-Commerce Research Center, said that consumers can choose to "compare three stores" to distinguish whether they are being "raped", or shop with different consumers under the same conditions. Compare prices for the same product to see if there are any differences, and always pay attention to whether the price changes of products provided on the same platform are too large, etc.

“If consumers discover that price discrimination does exist, they should promptly save evidence and communicate with the platform. At the same time, they can report the situation to relevant departments to safeguard their legitimate rights and interests.” Meng Huixin said.

It is worth noting that the new regulations put forward clear requirements for the reporting and complaint channels of online travel platforms. Article 22 of the "Interim Provisions" shows that online tourism operators should publicize the 12301 national tourism service hotline and other reporting and complaint channels in a prominent position, and establish and improve dispute resolution mechanisms and early warning publicity systems.

"For a long time, there have been problems such as price 'killing' and false propaganda in various travel services such as air tickets and accommodation provided on OTA platforms, which have not been dealt with. The release of the "Interim Regulations" further improved and refine existing laws and regulations to stipulate the legal attributes and scope of use of big data. At the same time, it strengthens the supervision of OTA platforms, which is conducive to the standardized development of the online travel industry," Meng Huixin said.

According to China Securities Journal, CCTV Finance, Sino-Singapore Jingwei Client