‘APEC committee, hotels need to work out rates’

The national organizing committee of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) should sit down with Cebu hotel managers to resolve the issue of expensive  room rates.

“I think the organizing committee has to coordinate with hotels na huwag naman itaas dahil alam naman nila na marami ang pupunta dito at marami tayong (that they shouldn’t raise rates because there are many  people headed here and we have a lot of) delegates. They should be given consideration,” said Rep. Mark Villar of the lone district of Las Piñas who was in Cebu yesterday.

In order to ensure the success of the APEC meetings, Villar said Cebu should extend its  hospitality to  foreign guests.

“We have to show them hospitality because there are visitors. The planning should be better.  We should work on our planning so there’s better coordination,’ he said.

Villar, who chairs the trade and industry committee of the House of Congress said “coordination” is enough to address the concern on costly hotel rates raised by Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Laura del Rosario during her Cebu visit last Friday.

READ: WHY JACK UP  HOTEL RATES?

Del Rosario appealed for hotels to be “reasonable” after she received complaints from delegates that rates in at least three venue hotels had shot up by 120 percent for bookings on APEC meeting dates.

Villar said while hotels should not be barred from adjusting rates, the NOC could work out a scheme that would allow foreign delegates to avail of “bulk rates” when they book in advance.

“Bulk rates – commit the rooms so it won’t be expensive. Because if the hotel knows that there would be an event, they can reserve rooms,” he said.

Ambassador Marciano Paynor flew to Cebu on Friday to get in touch with  hotel managers, who explained that the increases were an “industry practice” based on increased demand.

However, September is not normally a peak seasons for hotels.

Cebu expects 3,200 delegates to be coming in and out of the island from Aug. 22 to Sept. 6 for the Third Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM3) and related meetings.

After reading the issue bannered in local papers yesterday, Villar said he was confident the glitch could be worked out.

“The delegates are our guests. We should improve our coordination with the hotels so our guests won’t be angry,” he said.