Travelers will soon be able to book accommodations to Cuba through TripAdvisor, one of the world’s largest travel websites. It’s the latest development in a U.S. travel industry that is slowly expanding tourism to the Communist nation.
The license, granted by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, will allow TripAdvisor to book travel to Cuba for both U.S. and non-U.S. citizens, including for hotels, flights, cultural tours and short-term rentals, the company said.
TripAdvisor expects to begin travel-related sales to Cuba within the next few months, the company said.
“TripAdvisor looks forward to helping travelers all over the world discover Cuba’s vibrant history, people and culture as we begin the important work to make these trips possible,” said Stephen Kaufer, the president and chief executive of TripAdvisor.
It’s another step toward normalizing tourism to Cuba, but the reason for visiting must still fall into one of the 12 categories authorized by the Treasury office, which include family visits, academic programs, professional research and journalistic or religious activities.
Currently, travelers can search for flights and hotels using TripAdvisor and other booking sites, but for purchases they are redirected to third-party sites like Booking.com that are registered outside the United States. The license will allow TripAdvisor to sell to travelers directly on its website.
Booking.com, a hotel-reservation site based in Amsterdam, said in March that it had reached agreements with several Cuban hotels to join its booking system.
The license granted to TripAdvisor is similar to the ones granted earlier in the year to companies like Starwood for hotels and JetBlue and several other airlines for flights, and in 2015 to Airbnb for vacation rentals, TripAdvisor said.
The expanded travel options to Cuba began materializing after President Barack Obama announced in 2014 that the United States would restore diplomatic relations with the country.
“We applaud President Obama’s policies to ease these restrictions and build relations with our island neighbor just 90 miles south of Florida,” Kaufer said in a statement.
