Booking.com: change in the payment policy

Will residents in Morocco be able to continue to book their stay via the Booking.com online platform? Nothing is less certain. The Dutch booking site has just made a radical decision. Indeed, following “a change in the requirements from the Moroccan central bank, Bank Al-Maghrib”, the Booking.com company will no longer accept the payment of its invoices in Moroccan Dirhams. Until now, these commissions were paid by national hoteliers through a “DLocal ” account, opened with a Moroccan bank before being transferred in foreign currency to the Booking.com account in the Netherlands, but, from now on, invoices will be issued in Euros, and the amount of commissions will have to be paid by transfer in European currency and no longer in Moroccan Dirhams, which represents a major change for the national hotel industry that was used to selling its rooms through the electronic platform. The invoices in question relate to commissions collected by the booking site when its electronic platform is used by residents, whether Moroccan or foreign nationals, to book a hotel room. “ It is actually a return to the old system. As a reminder, until 2015, we used to pay commissions in foreign currency, including for bookings made by residents. We then negotiated an agreement to be able to pay in Moroccan Dirhams via an account opened in Morocco, with the Moroccan bank then transferring these amounts in foreign currency. I think that Bank Al-Maghrib has called Moroccan banks to order , telling them that they are not allowed to carry out this operation”, explained a hotelier.
Still according to its assumption the central bank estimates that funds paid in constant dirhams into a local account cannot be transferred in foreign currency abroad, which is only possible in the case of an account in convertible dirhams or in hard currencies. Moreover, by paying for services 100% produced and consumed in Morocco by residents, the commercial bank of Booking.com equates this operation with imports, which is false. When a resident books his or her hotel room in Morocco, in an accommodation establishment located in the Kingdom, on a platform, even if such a platform is located abroad, this is neither an import nor an export. However, this modus operandi, which dates back several years, has never aroused the suspicivons of any regulator. The problem has become national: it concerns foreign exchange reserves, since the turnover is made in constant (inflation-adjusted) dirhams and commissions must be paid in foreign currencies. For the moment, no unified position has been taken by the industry. However, since the decision has been made on July 3, the first invoices will begin to arrive from the 17th of this same month onwards. 

Hassan EL ARIF