Every man for himself
Pham Le Thao, Deputy Head of the Travel Department of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) informed at a recent workshop on Vietnam’s tourism development several days ago, that in the first 10 months of 2011, Vietnam received 4.8 million tourists. However, the worrying thing is that the number of tourists to Vietnam has been decreasing since September due to the economic crisis in many countries in the world.
Thao has warned that 2012 would be a very difficult year for Vietnam’s tourism, urging travel firms, transport companies, hotels and food service providers to join forces to attract more travelers.
Ha Van Sieu, head of the Tourism Research and Development Institute, noted that for the last many years, Vietnamese companies have been just taking care for their benefits, but not for the common benefits.
To prove the viewpoint, Bich Lien from Cuu Long travel firm from Vinh Long province, said that a lot of tour guides lead travelers to Vinh Long province, but they always want to change the destination points and want to lead travelers to go shopping from which they can get commissions.
Meanwhile, hotels usually stay unconstructive with travel firms when they push the hotel room rates up on the high seasons. Vuong The Hung, Director of Tan Dai Luc Trade and Tourism Company, said that in the sea city of Nha Trang, the 2-star hotel room rates always increase by 50 or 100 percent on holidays.
Hung went on to say that travel firms still cannot send tour fee quotations to partners, even though Tet is nearing, because it is very difficult to book railway tickets, while air carriers have not replied to the questions about the airfares.
Also according to Sieu, travel firms complain that it is very difficult to join hands with customs agencies, transport companies or air carriers, while the link between the State and businesses remains loosened
Symbiosis will help all survive and develop
Replying to the accusation of travel firms about the difficulties in booking railway tickets, Phung Thi Ly Ha, Deputy Head of the Hanoi Railway Station, said that in this case, it is the travel firms which make troubles to themselves.
The problem is that travel firms themselves competed fiercely with each other. A lot of travel firms book tickets in big quantities, which forced Ha and her officers to make big efforts to arrange enough tickets. Meanwhile, they finally realized that there were only few groups of travelers.
In many cases, Ha said, travel firms booked tickets without any plan informed in advance.
“We do not have accurate information about the number of travelers. We just guess the figures after considering the figures of previous years,” Ha said.
Meanwhile, reasoning difficulties relating to the fuel price increases and the exchange rate fluctuations, air carriers have called on involved parties to sit together to discuss the solutions for cooperation.
Hoang Thanh Quy, a senior executive of Vietnam Airlines said that instead of blaming each other, involved parties should spend time discussing how to cooperate in the most effective way, stressing that the parties need to join forces and only symbiosis will help all survive and develop.
The reports submitted by the north, central and southern offices of the air carrier show that the total number of seats for Tet flights is about 25,000, which will be taken from December 2011 to mid February 2012. Quy said that Vietnam Airlines is still offering air tickets with preferential rates for travel firms.
Ngoc Ha
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