Cancún hoteliers say a 25 percent Visitax hike and forcing hotels to collect it would harm tourism, squeeze small hotels and undercut Plan México.
Cancún’s hotel industry is lining up against a plan to raise Quintana Roo’s tourist departure tax and turn hotels into tax collectors, warning that the move could backfire on a state that lives off tourism.
The proposal would increase the so-called Visitax by 25 percent and require hotels and other tourism businesses to charge and remit the fee directly from their guests. For years, foreign visitors arriving by air have paid the tax online or at airport kiosks before flying home.
Created in 2021 as a state “aprovechamiento” on international visitors, Visitax currently costs about 224 pesos per person, roughly 10 to 11 US dollars, and applies to popular destinations such as Cancún, Playa del Carmen and Cozumel. The new scheme would both raise that charge and change how it is collected.
Visitax hike Quintana Roo
In a formal statement, the Caribbean Hotel Council, which represents hotel associations across Quintana Roo, argued that the 25 percent hike and the plan to make hotels “jointly responsible” for collecting the tax would erode the state’s competitiveness and legal certainty. The group says the measure threatens investors, suppliers, visitors and workers in what is Mexico’s flagship tourism economy.
The council notes that other global destinations are cutting or freezing visitor fees to attract more travelers amid a cooling global economy. By contrast, they say, raising Visitax while shifting the administrative burden onto hotels would push Quintana Roo in the opposite direction and could leave Mexico at a disadvantage against Caribbean competitors.
A central concern is how the measure aligns with the federal government’s economic strategy, Plan México. That plan, presented this year, aims to draw investment, boost high-value jobs and make Mexico one of the world’s top five tourism destinations by 2030, in part by improving the country’s international image and reducing frictions for visitors. Hotel leaders argue that making a holiday more expensive and turning front desks into tax collectors runs counter to that message.
They also stress that most large resorts in Cancún and the Riviera Maya sell packages abroad months in advance, locking in prices with tour operators and online agencies. Under those contracts, hotels say they cannot add a new tax without renegotiating deals or absorbing the cost themselves, which would squeeze margins in a sector that already faces high energy and payroll costs.
Operational worries run just as deep. Today, the tax is primarily handled through a state-run portal and airport checks. Under the proposed model, thousands of hotels, guesthouses and tour companies would be expected to calculate, charge, track and remit Visitax for each foreign guest. The hotel council warns that such a dispersed system invites errors and, in some cases, abuses, while exposing front-line staff to arguments at check-in and check-out.
The group believes the likely outcome is not a dramatic jump in revenue, but a wave of customer complaints and administrative headaches that could damage the Caribbean coast’s reputation as an easy, friendly destination.
In southern destinations such as Chetumal and Bacalar, where many properties are small, family-run hotels, the council points out that the Visitax bill for a couple can already approach the price of a night’s stay. A higher tax, collected directly by the property, would hit those budget operations hardest and could undermine efforts to promote multi-destination trips that combine big-resort hubs with quieter towns and lagoon communities.
Hoteliers seek a rethink of the tax plan
Beyond economics, hotel leaders are raising legal questions about the state’s proposal. They argue that designating hotels as “solidary” collectors of a levy on foreign visitors stretches constitutional principles of legality, proportionality and equity, because lodging businesses are not directly involved in the activities the tax is meant to support.
Industry groups point to criteria from Mexico’s Supreme Court that say a company can only be made jointly responsible for a tax when there is a clear link between its activity and the taxable event. In their view, hosting travelers is not the same as carrying out the purposes for which Visitax was created, and forcing hotels into that role would amount to an improper delegation of state power.
The debate comes after years of confusion around the tax itself. Since Visitax was launched, some travelers have complained about unofficial websites charging extra fees or pretending to process payments, prompting calls from both officials and hotel operators to clean up the system and strengthen the state’s own payment portal. Business groups say they support closing loopholes and tackling fraud, but argue that pushing collection onto hotels is an overcorrection.
They also emphasize the size of the stake. According to the hotel council’s figures, Quintana Roo’s lodging sector offers more than 138,000 rooms, generates over 20 billion dollars a year in foreign exchange and supports hundreds of thousands of direct and indirect jobs. Any measure that risks discouraging visitors, they say, should be weighed against its potential impact on that employment base.
For now, the proposal remains part of the broader discussion over Quintana Roo’s 2026 fiscal package. Hotel leaders are urging the state government to withdraw or redesign the Visitax changes and to seek alternatives that align with Plan México’s promise of a more competitive, visitor-friendly country. Until that happens, the question hanging over Cancún’s hotel strip is whether a higher tax is worth the risk of sending tourists, and their spending, somewhere else.
