Atta chief shocked at decline
November 4, 2009 by Chanida Sa-ngiamphaisalsuk
Filed under News
Clients handled by Thailand’s tour operators were well below earlier estimates cited by the Association of Thai Travel Agents’ president, Surapol Sritrakul.
He admitted that he was disappointed by the latest report, 1 to 20 October, that covers clients handled by travel agencies at Suvarnabhumi Airport, Bangkok.
Instead of an anticipated 140,000 customers, members handled just 89,388. He blamed it on Thailand’s political situation and the threat of rail strikes, although very few mainstream tourists use the trains for their holiday travel.
Also on an international front, Thailand is not a front page story in global media and there has been very little change in the political scenario causing political observers to take a deep yarn and move on to more fertile territory.
Considering these factors, Mr Surapol’s comments on the cause of the continued decline in business lacks substance.
However, he assured members, the committee was working on bringing back tourists to the country through various campaigns that would reach business partners and also through participation in TAT road shows.
Foreign tourists arriving at Suvarnabhumi Airport and handled by Atta members, 1 January to 20 October, declined 30.05% from 1,797,362 to 1,257,206. The top five nationalities were China, Japan, India, Russia and Korea. Just three of the 20 top markets showed an increase. They were: India; Hong Kong and Iran.
Mr Surapol said he thought his members could garner 1.5 million trips by the end of the year, but it would be lowest result in the last 10 years.
Booking patterns are changing. The numbers are there. The question is why aren’t these numbers coming through ATTA members. Is it because travel is being booked online more than through traditional channels ? Shouldn’t ATTA leadership think more in terms of advising their members to get an online presence ? To market differently ?
Good point. Most of the ATTA members don’t even have staff who are competent in English, let alone able to make a website interactive and efficient. If these relics of the past don’t get their acts together the travel agency business in Thailand will die off completely. More and more tourist and business trip bookings are done online, but without a professional presence these agencies are living in another world. And the tourists don’t want illiterate, bad English and wild claims, just the facts. Competition is out there making a mint, so ATTA should invest as Ashley says, in advising members to come towards the light.
Have to agree with both of the above.
At our company, we note that now about 40% of our incoming passengers are now arriving through Phuket Airport due to the direct flights coming from various destinations.
Which of course we don’t have to inform ATTA about the above,even though we are one of ATTA members. Since ATTA only handles passengers arriving at Bkk International Airport.
ATTA also forgets that 60% of our tourists are repeaters – and definitely they would book their own arrangement not through travel agents.
Weep for this travel warrior. He hasn’t worked out that Thailand is yesterday’s brand and that no amount of “various campaigns” will work if the entire structure of the tourism industry is not revisited from the top. The TAT is putting people off visiting here because of their pathetic overseas freeloading tours, and when tourists get here it is the same old, same old, where you fom, buy me dink attitude of the operators.