You discover a parity break: an OTA is showing your rate at €15 below what you set. Two responses: pull your rate from that OTA entirely (close the channel temporarily), or call the OTA KAM and demand a fix. Both are valid in different situations. Choosing wrong costs you revenue, KAM relationship, or both.
When to pull the rate
Pull when: the deviation is large (>€30 or >15% of rate), the OTA is unresponsive within 4 hours, the break is affecting a high-demand period where the price differential is costing material revenue, OR the same OTA has had repeated issues over 30 days.
Pulling the rate stops the bleeding immediately. The downside: OTA visibility drops within 6-12 hours, you lose conversion during the closure, and the KAM relationship takes a hit because you escalated unilaterally. Use sparingly — once per quarter per OTA at most.
When to call the OTA
Call when: the deviation is small to moderate (€5-€30), the OTA is responsive (they have fixed issues quickly in the past), the break is on a low-to-medium demand period, OR you have evidence the source is on the OTA side (not your CM).
Calling the OTA preserves the relationship and gets the fix without operational disruption. The downside: it takes time (typical KAM response: 2-6 hours, fix: 6-24 hours), during which the parity break continues. For small deviations on low-demand periods, this is the right trade-off.
The escalation path
A practitioner does both in sequence on a serious break. First: pull the rate (stops the bleeding). Second: call the KAM with the screenshot and ask for a fix. Third: once fixed, re-open the rate and document the incident. This gives you immediate protection and the audit trail that prevents finger-pointing later.
Document every pull and every call in the parity-break log. After 90 days, you have data on which OTAs are responsive and which are not — feeding into the contract renewal conversation where you can make leverage from the documented response times.