China drives agency business

BANGKOK, 9 May 2013: Association of Thai Travel Agents’ member companies handled 1,624,513 international tourists at Suvarnabhumi Airport in the first four months of this year representing substantial improvement of 46.40% over 1,109,623 visits during the same period last year.

ATTA released its data, Wednesday, based on fees member agencies pay to the airport to provide a meet-and-greet service for international clients. It is considered an accurate barometer for the tourism industry but is limited to travel through Bangkok.

China continued as the top market for travel agency business with well over 500,000 visits up 78% on the same period last year. Experts predict it will continue to boom benefiting all Southeast Asia destinations, the preferred travel region for the majority of China’s first-time travellers.

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UK travellers are cautious on spending

BANGKOK, 26 April 2013: Due to the economic crisis, tourists from the United Kingdom are considering their travel options more carefully according to Tourism Authority of Thailand London office director, Siripakorn Cheawsamoot.

The director, using a Skype’s tele-conference feature, urged the Association of Thai Travel Agents’ members to adjust their tourism products and adapt to tourists’ changing behaviour.

“A weak pound forces UK tourists to be careful when choosing destination …however they still prefer to travel to long-haul destinations, while reducing trip frequency for short and medium-haul destinations.”

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Asian tourists drive agency business

BANGKOK, 3 April 2013: Association of Thai Travel Agents’ member companies handled 1,249,109 international tourists at Suvarnabhumi Airport in the first quarter of this year representing an improvement of 48.10% over 843,396 visits during the same quarter last year.

ATTA released its data, Tuesday, based on fees member agencies pay to the airport to provide a meet-and-greet service for international clients. It is considered an accurate barometer for the tourism industry, but is limited to travel through Bangkok.

The latest  improvement would suggest travel agents are increasing their market share, but it is largely an improvement based on a robust Chinese market that is still dominated by group tours.

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Domestic travel agents lose out

BANGKOK, 27 March 2013: Association of Domestic Travel estimates domestic travel could account for as many as 30 million trips and Bt200,000 million in tourism revenue during March to May this year, but it will not benefit domestic travel agents.

Overall the association president admits the  market is declining as Thai prefer to organise their own trips in the country rather than use travel agencies.

ADT president, Yutthachai Soonthronrattanavate, said there was a strong shift in the market that sees Thais confidently  organising their own travel and booking online or using social media and smart phone applications to source travel opportunities.

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Watch your competitors

BANGKOK, 28 November 2012: Tourism experts suggest Thailand should have a strong identity and seek business partners when  the ASEAN region upgrades to a single market in 2015.

Speaking at the Association of Thai Tourism Marketing meeting on Creating Tourism Marketing Opportunity for AEC, Tuesday, Dr Seree Wongmontha, said Thai tourism operators should know who is their competitor besides just concentrating on tourist marketing.

“Also, they should have a concrete tourism strategy to compete when liberalisation arrives especially in the field of tourism human resources and English language skills.”

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Switzerland goes for specialists

Switzerland Tourism aims to increase arrivals from the region by training travel agents to be “Swiss travel specialists. The programme started in China and extended to Thailand, last week, with a presentation to travel agencies in Bangkok.

To gain endorsement, travel agencies have to complete training courses through an e-learning scheme that aims to appoint 50 specialists by the end of 2013, two in each travel agencies that join the learning programme. The courses are presented on elearning-ASEAN.myswitzerland.com.

Switzerland Tourism said it expects arrivals from Thailand to improve 15% annually as well deliver an improved length of stay through the launch of the Swiss specialists programme.

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Pricing hurts Vietnam’s tourism

HANOI, 8 November 2012: A leading Vietnamese travel agent says persistent problems particularly high prices and poor tourism promotions are keeping tourists away from visiting Vietnam.

Hanoi Redtour deputy general director, Nguyen Cong Hoan, said the economic crisis in major markets like the United States and Europe was hurting tourist arrivals, but the situation was not helped by high prices and poor tourism promotions.

“The global economic slowdown has forced people to reduce spending especially for travel,” he said noting the downturn was hurting Vietnam’s tourism industry more seriously than the declines in 2008 to 2009.

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TAcentre offers wholesale portal

BANGKOK, 18 October 2012: Asiatravel.com launched TAcentre.com, an online wholesale portal, Tuesday,  that includes package bookings with instant confirmation as a key feature to support SME travel agencies.

TAcentre.com, co-developed with Amadeus, is an upgrade version of the Asiatravel’s B2B portal.

Previously the site could support only flights, hotels, tours and attractions bookings as separate items.

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ATTA fights park fee hikes

BANGKOK, 4 September 2012: Association of Thai Travel Agents has submitted letters to government agencies requesting an immediate postponement of revised national park fees that are supposed to be effective 1 October.

ATTA has also demanded an explanation from the Department of National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation on why it needed to more than double entrance fees.

ATTA secretary-general, Charoen Wangananont told TTR Weekly that the association submitted letters, last Wednesday, to three government agencies: Ministry of Tourism and Sports; Department of National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation and the Standing Committee on the Tourism and Sports of the House of Representatives.

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Wanted coms expert

VIENTIANE 21 August 2012: Green Discovery Laos, an ecotourism and adventure travel specialist, is looking or a communications manager to head up a new public relations division in the company.

The company is a leader in the soft-adventure market in Laos and has pioneered most recently a zipline attraction and an ecotourism project near Pakse, in South Laos.

Applications are open to both Lao and expatriates who have a strong background in communications and marketing and  are ready to take up a new and

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