Sean O'Neill
Senior Hospitality Editor at Skift
Senior hospitality editor at @Skift, reporting on hotels /πΊπΈπ³οΈβπ/ [email protected] or DM for Signal.
Articles
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1 week ago |
skift.com | Sean O'Neill
A cascade of tourist tax proposals is sweeping across the UK after Edinburgh became the first British city to approve a 5% hotel bed tax starting July 2026. Edinburgh's move, announced last August, has triggered a wave of similar tourist tax proposals across Britain as cash-strapped local governments eye taking a cut of tourism revenue while making it costlier to visit.
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2 weeks ago |
skift.com | Sean O'Neill
The U.S. Senate and House passed legislation this week that would affect the take-home pay of tipped workers, including hundreds of thousands of hotel employees who provide housekeeping, food and beverage, bellhop, and concierge services. The topics of tips and taxes and are politically sensitive. Many of the hotel companies we reached out to didn't want to speak about it. But here's what the industry's hope is: Tax-free tips might make the country's 2.17 million hotel jobs more appealing.
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2 weeks ago |
skift.com | Sean O'Neill
Wyndham launched a tool on Tuesday that enables members of its loyalty program to redeem points to attend live music concerts, major sports events, and other travel experiences. The new effort is called Wyndham Rewards Experiences and over 100 activities were available at launch, including ones from Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall, Minor League Baseball, and Caesars Rewards.
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2 weeks ago |
skift.com | Sean O'Neill
Ascott, the Southeast Asian hotel group, says it's actively seeking resort acquisitions to round out its portfolio of extended-stay travel lodging. "We certainly would want to be acquiring resorts," said Wong Kar Ling, its chief strategy officer, at the Skift Asia Forum last week. Wong, who led Ascott's acquisition of Oakwood in 2022, said that corporate travelers accumulating loyalty points in Ascott's rewards program often want more fun vacation redemption options.
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3 weeks ago |
skift.com | Sean O'Neill
Major hotel companies reported mixed expectations for travel spending, revealing the uneven impact of economic uncertainty across customer segments. "What most stood out to us from this past earnings season for the hotel companies was the sizable differentiation in expectations, which ranged from bullish to highly cautious," wrote analysts at Truist on Monday. While IHG and Accor maintained optimistic forecasts, Wyndham, Marriott, Hilton, and Hyatt trimmed their expectations.
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