Culture
Ministry announces plans to eradicate tourist rip-offs, increase number of
licensed tour guides
A Japanese tourist who took a call van from
Dongdaemun to Chungmuro, both in central Seoul, was taken aback when the driver
demanded 330,000 won for the 2 km ride. The driver even locked up the
protesting tourist in the car for five minutes.
Another group of Japanese tourists was told to
pay 50,000 won for one kimchijeon (a Korean-style pancake made with kimchi) and
two bottles of beer at a covered cart near Namdaemun market in central Seoul.
These are but a couple of incidents reported
in the local press, according to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism,
which announced plans on Monday to eradicate practices that tarnish Korea’s
image as a tourism destination.
“Such situations are crucial problems that
hold back the development of Korea’s tourism industry, which is moving into the
20 million tourist era. We will tackle the issues seriously at the
pan-government level to offer fair and dignified services to foreign
travelers,” said Shin Yong-eon, head of the Culture Ministry’s Tourism Industry
Department.
The Culture Ministry’s plans can be summarized
in five points ― eliminate rip-offs, improve low-priced travel packages used by
Chinese tourists, increase the number of licensed tour guides, eradicate
overpriced medical tourism fees and secure the safety of Koreans traveling
abroad.
To eradicate rip-offs, the Culture Ministry
said it will strengthen its supervision of vendors jointly with local
governments and the National Police Agency, as well as distribute correct
information through the Visit Korea website (www.visitkorea.com) and SNS
services. It also plans to link 1330, a tourism information phone number, with
112, the emergency number for police assistance, so that travelers can
immediately report to the police in their native languages, such as English,
Japanese, Chinese.
Success of the plan depends, however, largely
on the conscience of the Korean workers, such as call van operators, and it is
difficult to catch them on the spot, said Shin, adding that everyone living and
working near such operators should act as monitors by reporting to the police
and informing tourists.
To deal with low-priced tour packages aimed at
Chinese tourists, the Culture Ministry hopes to legislate a tourism law that
will regulate exaggerated advertisements and have tourism agencies specialized
for Chinese tourists renew their business guideline to prevent unreasonably
low-priced packages or bribery.
The Culture Ministry also announced plans to
establish a system to scope out unlicensed tour guides and even suspend the
operation of travel agencies that hire such guides.
In terms of overpriced medical tourism, the
Culture Ministry vowed to work with the Ministry of Health and Welfare to
better track down illegal brokers, and have medical institutions directly
explain the medical fees to the patients.
In addition, the ministry will make travel
agencies inform Koreans who wish to travel abroad of travel bans and travel
advisories. It will also conduct special education for travel agencies
specializing in pilgrimages to the Holy Land.
Park Min-young
The Korea Herald
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