It appears that hotels and car rentals in SPAIN will require us to provide bank account information. Is this correct? Please read the attached:
https://www.travelandtourworld.com/news/article/spain-france-italy-germany-greece-uk-netherlands-portugal-belgium-austria-sweden-and-across-europe-with-new-entry-permits-schengen-expansions-fingerprinting-and-more-new-changes-what-glob/
Posted by
Citizen of the World
2167 posts
Spain is now the #1 tourist destination in Europe and is expecting an avalanche of tourists to visit in 2025– more than 95 million by some estimates. That is double the number of the 48 million people who now live in Spain.
It’s already a rule in much of Europe—though rarely enforced—that tourists are to show proof of health insurance coverage and sufficient funds for their stay. Governments want tourists to be a positive economic force and not a drain on taxpayers’ dollars. This— along with the need to deter criminal syndicates from laundering money from drug and human trafficking—is why banking information will be collected. If you pay for your trip with a Citibank credit card— that is different from paying for it with cash transfers from, say, a Bank of Moscow account.
The new rules ask for the name of your bank— not the CVV code on the back of your credit card as many hotels and booking agencies already ask for when you reserve a room. So, the security concern may be misdirected on this particular issue. The impact of twice the number of tourists as residents coming into Spain has had a huge impact on
housing costs. Affordable housing has become unavailable to residents as many landlords have converted apartments into short-term vacation rentals for tourists. This has become a huge political problem and headache in Spain.
The Spanish government says the new fingerprinting rule is to deter known criminals from entering Spain.
To some, these changes are seen as an invasion of their privacy.
The government in Madrid clearly has decided that it is OK if some travelers choose to visit another country; Spain already has enough visitors—perhaps even more than it can currently deal with.
Posted by
Mid-Atlantic area
7265 posts
This has been brought up previously and the information being asked for isn’t much different than what was provided when making a reservation in the past. Under the new law the hotel needs to provide the information to a government ministry. It may take a couple more minutes to check into a hotel, but overall it isn’t a big deal.