The traveler registration that travel agencies, hotels and car rental companies without a driver must do from this Monday is activated with the opposition of the sector, especially the agencies, which consider that it adds bureaucratic burden and will increase the prices of trips.
From this Monday, they must transmit to the application "ses.hospedajes" the data that hotel companies already collect on a regular basis and travel agencies are incorporated into this obligation.
The objective is to have "precise and indispensable" information for the security forces, because the regulations were obsolete (the registration of overnight stays has existed since 1959 and the control of vehicle rentals since 1974) and did not include new business modalities, such as tourist homes, portals and digital reservation centers, according to sources from the Ministry of the Interior.
The data that must be provided for clients includes first and last name, gender, ID, nationality, date of birth, usual place of residence, phone numbers, email address, number of travelers, and relationship (in the event that any is a minor) and transaction data.
Travel agencies argue that this data collection adds a bureaucratic burden that they cannot assume, because 95% are SMEs and in many cases with only one employee, which means that they must extend working hours; and they warn about the possibility that it will cause closures and a hypothetical increase in the price of trips.
Hoteliers have also expressed their rejection of the rule and announce that they are studying legal actions.
So far, 61,540 hotel establishments, 1,094 travel agencies, 222 digital platforms and 1,720 vehicle rental companies have contributed 4.77 million data to the application.
With them, the Ministry of the Interior has located 18,584 people about whom there was a police request and who appeared in national alert databases or in the Schengen Area information system.