Wednesday, August 28, 2019
The Tourism Department of Thailand is planning to set minimum prices for outbound tour packages so that they can deal with the growing price war that could eventually lower service quality.
Taweesak Wanichcharoen, the director-general of the department, said that minimum prices for outbound services are allowed under the Tourism Business and Guide Act 2008, but it has not been put into effect seriously.
He said that the department is thinking about standardizing the business with minimum prices set for each region, such as Europe, America and Asia. However, it is considering excluding China, as the market is huge and need a variety of tour prices.
Mr. Taweesak discussed with travel associations including the Thai Travel Agents Association before setting up minimum prices of tour packages.
This move aims to increase confidence among travellers when buying tour packages, preventing them from being cheated by operators offering low-price tours.
In recent years, there were quite a lot of infamous cases of operators offering low-priced tour programmes overseas, but those trips never happened, leaving customers stranded at the airport.
Outbound tourism has been growing robustly, with 10 million Thai tourists going overseas for trips last year, going up from 3.9 million a decade ago.
Mr. Taweesak said that the department is also thinking about setting minimum prices for domestic tour packages.
Tags: Thailand Tourism
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