It is a principle of the European Union's single market that all consumers should be treated equally when making online purchases (non-discrimination), even when visiting a museum in another member state (i.e. if an Italian 12-year old can visit the coliseum for free, a Bulgarian 12-year old should also receive free admission). Because of this, I believe the European Commission would find Airbnb's 3-percent currency conversion racket particularly upsetting. Effectively, and I'm estimating very roughly here, this means that for a €1,000 booking in Spain, a European outside the eurozone (i.e.a Romanian, a Dane, a Scot, a Swede) will end up being forced to pay about €30 more -- in the form of mandatory dynamic currency conversion or Aibnb's "currency conversion fee" -- for the same booking than a European resident in a eurozone country would pay (i.e. an Italian or French person booking the property in Spain).

(Needless to say, the American or Japanese person booking in Spain would also pay the "extra service fee" rate, given the currency conversion scam.)

At a time when relations between the U.S. and EU are increasingly rotten, and given that the EU seems predisposed to discipline U.S. tech giants for exploiting Europeans and the single market, I think now might be a good time to write to the EU and suggest increased regulatory enforcement against Airbnb for the currency conversion scam.

I'd suggest here is a good place to contact the EU and let them know how we feel: http://ec.europa.eu/competition/cont...uments_en.html