Tour operators have criticised a decision by the City of Rome to double its hotel tourist tax from today.
From this week, a family of four staying at a four-star Rome hotel for four nights must now pay €96 in local hotel tax, as opposed to €48 last week.
Operators said Rome only gave five weeks’ notice of the changes to the tax, which was first introduced four years ago.
"Hotels have been sold at one price and now have to charge another. This is an imposition on a completed transaction," said a statement by the European Tour Operators Association.
Jennifer Tombaugh, president of Tauck said: "We have already begun selling our 2015 journeys with pricing calculated on rates that did not include the proposed tax increase. Our business model does not permit us to go back to our clients with increased pricing or surcharges.
"We must now reconsider any planned marketing activities intended to promote Italy and Rome, and instead consider investing those funds in promoting other destinations that will provide a better return on our investment."
ETOA’s CEO, Tom Jenkins said tourism relies on planning and on ‘predictable charges being assembled and presented to the visitor’.
"The finances of Rome must be in a desperate condition for them to resort to such a move," he added.
"Five weeks’ notice is an abject admission of failure in financial planning. Recently, Ignazio Marino, Rome’s mayor, rightly insisted that tourists were largely safe and welcome in his city. Their pockets are clearly not safe from his administration."
