The Federal Trade Commission ruled that ticket sellers, hotels and rental sites must disclose the total prices, including all fees, upfront. This would also prohibit them from hiding charges until the last minute, though NBC News reports that the president-elect could withdraw the rule or Republicans on congress pass a law to vacate it.
"We all know the experience of encountering a hidden fee at the very last stage of checkout — these junk fees sneak onto your bill and companies end up making you pay more because they can. Those fees add up, taking real money out of the pockets of Americans," Biden said in a statement.
Ticketmaster is among America's most hated companies for its bloated fees, and the vacation rental sites surely aren't far behind with their hidden ones. This is a good example of a regulation everyone seems to want except politicians, for reasons that they can only explain with the strangest abstractions, and judges, who seem often little more than politicians in robes. Do airlines have a constitutional right to hide fees and lie about prices? Apparently so…
A judge in Texas blocked a rule that would cap credit card late fees, and an appeals court in New Orleans blocked a requirement that airlines disclose baggage and other fees upfront. The cases are ongoing.
