The Fair Trade Commission, under the leadership of Chairman Joo Byung-ki, has officially penalized Trip.com Travel Singapore Private Limited and Trip.com Korea Co., Ltd. for multiple severe violations of the Electronic Commerce Act, imposing corrective measures alongside a collective fine of 10 million won (€5,694.32).
The regulatory intervention addresses a series of systemic operational failures identified across the Trip.com digital platform. Primarily, both international entities engaged in aggressive domestic commerce without securing the mandatory registrations required of mail-order businesses. Trip.com Singapore managed its digital marketplace and processed local airline ticket purchases from November 20, 2017, until September 23, 2025, without declaring its operations. Similarly, Trip.com Korea operated its localized commercial functions from April 17, 2020, through January 20, 2025, while completely bypassing identical reporting obligations.
Beyond registration failures, the investigation exposed deceptive consumer practices surrounding transaction cancellations and subscription withdrawals. Between early 2020 and mid-2025, both corporate arms systematically denied standard cash or original-payment refunds to customers seeking to cancel their flights. Instead of restoring funds directly to the consumer’s payment method, the platform substituted non-negotiable airline vouchers. This financial substitution was enforced through explicit digital notices stating that reimbursement could only occur through vouchers under specific airline policies, effectively obstructing consumers from exercising their legitimate statutory rights of contract withdrawal.
The regulatory body explicitly clarified that individual airline refund policies cannot supersede sovereign national protections; if an airline’s internal terms prove less favorable than the Electronic Commerce Act, enforcing them constitutes a direct breach of the law.
In response to the regulatory probe, both corporate entities have since rectified their baseline legal status, completing their respective mail-order business registrations throughout 2025. Furthermore, Trip.com has finalized retroactive consumer remediation measures, converting prior voucher balances into cash refunds and halting ticket distribution for any airline refusing to comply with cash reimbursement standards. The Fair Trade Commission has confirmed that it intends to maintain strict, ongoing oversight across all online travel platforms to guarantee that digital operators fully respect consumer cancellation protections moving forward.
