Existing law regulates various businesses to preserve and regulate competition and prohibit unfair practices, among other purposes. Existing law imposes various business practice restrictions on a food delivery platform, defined as an online business that acts as an intermediary between consumers and multiple food facilities to submit food orders from a consumer to a participating food facility, and to arrange for the delivery of the order from the food facility to the consumer. Existing law prohibits a food delivery platform from arranging the delivery of an order from a food facility without first obtaining an agreement with the food facility expressly authorizing the platform to take orders and deliver meals, as prescribed.
This bill would prohibit a third-party restaurant reservation service, as defined, from listing, advertising, promoting, or selling reservations for a food service establishment through the website, mobile application, or other platform of the third-party restaurant reservation service without a written agreement between that third-party restaurant reservation service and that food service establishment to include reservations at the food service establishment on that website, mobile application, or other platform.
The bill would authorize the Attorney General and a person who suffers harm for a violation of the act to recover specified civil penalties. The bill would also create in the State Treasury the California Restaurant Reservation AntiPiracy Act Fund into which any civil penalty recovered by the Attorney General pursuant to the act would be deposited and would make the moneys in the fund available, upon appropriation by the Legislature, for the purpose of the act.