In City of Rome v. Hotels.com, L.P., Case No. 12-14588 (decided December 13, 2013), municipalities in Georgia lost their bid to recover back taxes they allege should have been collected by online travel companies. Online travel companies purchase blocks of hotel rooms at a “wholesale” price. They then sell those rooms to travelers at a higher “retail” price. Many local governments in Georgia have a hotel/motel tax that requires the person renting a room to pay a tax that the hotel collects. In dealing with online travel companies, hotels were collecting and remitting taxes based on the wholesale price paid… Read more