Is Google Maps manipulating the market?

Is Google Maps manipulating the accommodation market place?
An organic search result for a specific business name is now feeding third party advertising directly into the organic, none paid content and diverting the conversion to a sale away from the business owner’s website.

In the accommodation industry if your business is listed in Google Maps and Places it’s only a matter of time before the results of a search using your business name includes a link to a third party booking site. Google began implementing the trial of this in 2010 and having integrated many of the major accommodation portals are now rolling this product out to a wider audience.

Google maintains that relevance is the dominant variable in its search engine algorithms and place relevance is the new driving force in SEO and search rankings. This is a fair call if your search is for accommodation in a particular street, suburb or town as accommodation in any other location would not be as relevant. What’s wrong is that the search term for a specific property in that location is now showing price and availability for that property provided from a third party which is a paying Google client. The effect of this on the business that owns the website will be enormous as the search instantly throws up a price and a link that directs the search away from the target site. The booking may ultimately come through to the property but via a commissionable sale instead of a direct non commissionable sale.

The only way around this for the accommodation provider is to either cease having a presence on Google Maps and Places or stop using the third party booking sites. Neither of which are good for business.
There is no ability to edit or select the source of the content that is being added to the search results so the only way around this for the accommodation provider is to either cease having a presence on Google Maps and Places or stop using the third party booking sites. Neither of which are good for business.

The idea itself is brilliant if only the source of the price and availability was the accommodation providers own website booking engine. This is the logical step forward as the consumer has already chosen the property they searched for by using the business name rather than a broader search for a similar service in the same location. So if Google is true to its mantra of relevance why is it not directing the search to the website that was the intention of the search in the first place?