The damage could exceed 200,000 euros, assures Christophe Sueur, the vice-president in charge of tourism with the community of municipalities (CdC) of the island of Oléron. This public authority is currently waging a standoff against online housing rental platforms, starting with the juggernaut Airbnb.
Responsible for collecting the tourist tax on each transaction, the American group would not have fulfilled all its obligations for the years 2020 and 2021. Collection rules specific to the island of Oléron would be at the origin of these bickering, argues Airbnb, which announced last December that it wanted to donate 93 million euros to French municipalities and intermunicipalities. The CdC disputes these statements and wishes to obtain the detailed list of stays invoiced on the island of Oléron, just to verify the data compiled by the platform.
A summary judgment was to rule on this point on Tuesday. But the CdC oléronaise finally gave up this first legal step: “On April 15, we received the files for the year 2020 from Airbnb. If we hadn’t gone to court, we would still be waiting. We only get a listening ear and answers from them under legal pressure”, Christophe Sueur gets annoyed.
Other reservation platforms concerned
However, the case is not over and the community of communes intends to pursue this “balance of power” on the merits, before the administrative and judicial courts if necessary. “We have no guarantee on the veracity of the figures provided, insists the elected official. We now want to know the calculation methods used by Airbnb and obtain interest on amounts due and not paid to date. This is public money! »
The CdC called on a specialized law firm to support it in this case. Because other platforms are also in its line of sight. “The Abritel group cooperates well, but not Booking.com. We have no response from them and will act in the same way, ”assures Christophe Sueur.
The elected official recalls that the tourist tax, donated to the Intercommunity Tourist Office, makes it possible to finance the salaries of its approximately thirty agents or even the actions to promote the territory.