Two hotels in Nha Trang City, Khanh Hoa Province, south-central Vietnam were fined VND10 million (US$424) each for improperly upgrading their hotel star ratings to promote their services on online travel websites and social media, local authorities said on Monday.

The two hotels are Areca on Phuong Cau Street in Van Thanh Ward and B&N on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street in Loc Tho Ward.

Areca declared itself as a four-star hotel and B&N stated the same on its Facebook page.

Both also listed themselves as four-star hotels on travel and accommodation booking platform Booking.com.

However, the result of an inspection by the Khanh Hoa Department of Information and Communications showed that Areca has not yet been recognized by any state agency and B&N was rated only three-star by authorities.

As a result, the owners of the two hotels were fined VND10 million each and were required to remove the false declarations.

A leader of the Khanh Hoa Department of Information and Communications said that it is difficult to handle fake grading on accommodation booking platforms, such as Booking.com and Agoda.com, given their physical absence in Vietnam and overseas server locations. 

Owners of hotels that are detected with incorrect star ratings often shift the responsibility to the foreign platforms.

As of early 2023, Khanh Hoa has had 1,148 tourist accommodation establishments, including 102 rated 3- to 5-star, accounting for nearly 50 percent of the total number of hotel rooms in the coastal tourist province.

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