# Governing the misconduct of OTA platforms: A tripartite evolutionary game analysis considering the collaborative supervision of airlines and consumers

## TL;DR

This paper proposes a collaborative approach to govern unfair practices by online travel agencies through a game model involving airlines and consumers.

## Contribution

A tripartite evolutionary game model is introduced to analyze collaborative supervision of OTA platforms.

## Key findings

- Strict airline control and high platform fines can reduce misconduct and improve cooperation.
- Consumer rights protection influences public opinion and forces platforms to self-regulate.
- Collaborative market mechanisms are more effective than government regulation in curbing misconduct.

## Abstract

Online travel agency (OTA) platforms frequently engage in unfair behaviors that infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of consumers and airlines in the ticket sale market. Effective governance of the OTA platforms’ misconduct has become an urgent topic. In order to address the governance dilemma of OTA platforms’ misconduct, a tripartite evolutionary game model considering the collaborative supervision between airlines and consumers is constructed. This study analyzes the evolutionary path and stable strategy of the three participants, airlines, platforms and consumers by numerical simulation. The results show that some actions, such as airlines’ strict control of ticket sales resources and high fines on the platform, reducing the cost of customers’ rights protection, and effectively guiding online public opinion, can benefit airlines and consumers and enhance their willingness to cooperate in supervision. Legitimate consumer rights protection not only brings negative public opinion and image loss to airlines, but also to platforms, which can force airlines to impose stricter constraints on platforms and force platforms to strengthen self-restraint. Therefore, a market mechanism instead of government regulatory that can effectively suppress platforms misconduct should be established to promote platforms self-regulation through a collaborative effort between airlines and consumers. Some special measures that guide the interests of three participators are also provided.