Should you trust Michelin's hotel ratings?

At an event at the Musee des Arts Decoratifs on the evening of Oct 8, the Michelin Guide unveiled its first global selection of keys - the equivalent of stars, but for hotels.

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But hours before, at a separate event at the ornate 18th-century Pozzo di Borgo mansion in Paris, it unveiled something more controversial: an honest look into the ways that it makes money from such reviews, both on the hotel and restaurant sides of its operations.

It was the first time that the French company spoke explicitly about what many have known to be true for years: that government-run tourism boards pay for Michelin Guide restaurant reviewers to come to their states and cities.

For years, questions have swirled in the travel industry about whether the company can maintain impartiality in awarding stars to restaurants while at the same time accepting payment from the tourism bodies charged with their promotion.

As it turns out, reviewing hotels - a costly practice that has become all but impossible for most publications to do in a thorough independent way - is what forced Michelin to come clean on its practices.

And that is not because Michelin is compromising its standards. Its executives confirmed that the company is paying full-price, publicly listed rates for every hotel it vets, and also for the flights required to get there. It does the same with restaurants, which it visits anonymously.

In order to go global with its hotel ratings, though, the guide has had to create different revenue streams.

In October 2018, it acquired the hotel booking platform Tablet, creating a platform for Michelin loyalists to plan and book their vacations. The company takes a cut from each booking at an industry standard rate of around 15 per cent.

All hotels that are awarded keys are listed on the website, though only a portion are bookable. Executives present made it clear that hotels do not need to be bookable on Michelin's site to qualify for keys.