S A Tourism has resigned its seat on the Advisory Board of MATCH, the FIFA accommodation and ticketing agency, according to BuaNewsonline, the government’s “quick and fresh … news and information” agency.

S A Tourism CEO Moeketsi Mosola had previously expressed his dissatisfaction with MATCH’s pressure on the pricing of accommodation for 2010.  He has motivated his organisation’s withdrawal from the Board on the basis of the “unfavourable trading terms placed on local accommodation establishments”.

“As we move towards 2010, we want you to know (as the South African tourism industry) that we at S A Tourism are on your side”,  Mosola told the delegates at the 7th Annual National Tourism Conference in Johannesburg yesterday.   He added that MATCH should be expected to pay market related prices for accommodation.

Mosola highlighted that MATCH was using “bullying tactics” to move block bookings made with hotels at the time of the bid announcement across to MATCH, according to TravelHub.   He said that the threat by MATCH to bring in cruise ships for additional accommodation, and it stating to FIFA that the country was short of accommodation,  was an unacceptable means of getting tour operators to release their accommodation holdings to MATCH.   He added that S A Tourism was defending the rights and interests of the tourism industry, and felt that it could communicate more effectively with MATCH from outside its Board than from within.

The MATCH contract sets the 2010 accommodation rates utilising a formula of the 2007 rate + 16 %.  The inflation rate this year alone is 13 % !  MATCH then adds on its 40 % commission fee to this rate.

It will be interesting to see how MATCH reacts to this announcement, and whether the accommodation industry will sign up.   Currently MATCH has only achieved a 50 % sign-up rate for its requirement of 55 000 beds for 2010.  The accommodation industry was given until the end of last month to sign up or lose out.  

Hospitality association FEDHASA Cape has been pressurising its members to sign up with MATCH, not understanding that the accommodation industry, in particular the small accommodation establishments such as guest houses and B & B’s, has been expressing its resistance to the unacceptable terms for the specially designed contract for this sector of the accommodation industry.  MATCH has not used the small accommodation industry for any previous World Cup event.

WhaleTales has long been critical of MATCH as far as its contract and pricing structure for small accommodation establishments is concerned.