Following posts by foreigners on a Chinese government website complaining that some hotels did not let them stay, the Ministry of Public Security and the National Immigration Administration issued a clarification, as reported by the OneTubeDaily's WeChat channel.
In response to inconveniences reported by netizens regarding the accommodation of overseas personnel, the Ministry of Public Security and the National Immigration Administration attach great importance to it and actively cooperate with industry regulatory departments such as the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism to study work measures. They require the hotel industry not to refuse to accept overseas personnel on the grounds of lack of foreign-related qualifications, and guide and supervise the hotel industry to further improve its foreign-related reception service capabilities and enhance the service level of employees.
At present, the Ministry of Commerce has guided the China Hotel Association to issue the “Proposal on Facilitating Accommodation Services for Foreigners in China”, promoting and guiding the improvement of legal and regulatory learning, reception capabilities and talent cultivation, encouraging accommodation enterprises to improve their level of foreign-related services, and providing more convenience for foreigners in China, such as to coordinate the network operation platform to open a series of courses on hotel English and other subjects, provide free hotel English training for accommodation operators stationed on the platform, such as check-in and room reservation, help accommodation industry practitioners improve their foreign language skills and provide better services for foreigners. The Ministry of Public Security is deploying public security organs in China to further optimize the management of accommodation registration services for overseas personnel in the hotel industry, facilitate their accommodation registration, and create a first-class business environment.
Article 39 of the Exit and Entry Administration Law of the People's Republic of China stipulates that “Where foreigners stay in hotels in China, the hotels shall register their accommodation in accordance with the regulations on the public security administration of the hotel industry, and submit foreigners’ accommodation registration information to the public security organs in the places where the hotels are located”.
Article 6 of the Measures on Public Security Administration of the Hotel Industry stipulates that “Hotels shall register the accommodation of travelers. When registering, the identity documents of the passengers should be checked and truthfully registered according to the prescribed items. When accommodating overseas passengers, the accommodation registration form should also be submitted to local public security organs within 24 hours.” Therefore, both Chinese and foreigners should register their accommodation in hotels according to the law and fulfill their legal obligations. Public security organs should guide the hotel industry to submit accommodation registration information for Chinese and foreigners in accordance with regulations.
