Air travel contributes significantly to the national economy every year. However, the fact that airline firms do not always cooperate well has caused worries for travel agents and been an obstacle for both parties’ development.
Mr Nguyen Van Tuan, Head of Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, said that in the first six months of 2011, tourists coming to Vietnam by air increased by 23.8 percent, whereas tourists coming by sea decreased by 15.2 percent and tourists coming by road reduced by 4.5 percent.
Difficulties for both travel agents and airline firms
The method used by many travel agents to kick up tourism demand is to reduce tour prices to increase the number of tourists after signing agreements with airline agents. For example, Saigontourist has cooperated with Vietnam Airlines, Japan Airlines and Japanese partners to restart tour IKO Travel. Ms Doan Thanh Tra, Marketing Manager of Saigontourist, said that the cooperation has helped to reduce tour price by VND12 million per tourist. Nevertheless, at the moment, many enterprises complain about airlines “working on their own direction”. On the other hand, cooperation between airlines and tourism to implement big projects and boost tourism development hasn’t worked as expected. Without mutual help in term of price and communication, cooperation between the two parties will not have large effect, said Ms Tra.
A survey on air tickets of some airlines shows that the current ticket price on sales to tourists is equal to normal price since airlines do their business not through travel agents; therefore, they have no preferential ticket price for travel enterprises. In addition, lack of tight cooperation between travel agents and airlines makes it difficult for agents to hold tours for large groups. Mr Le Quang Dao, Deputy Manager of Vietvision Travel, gave an example: while travel agents only need to pay 30 percent of hotel cost in advance and the rest when checking out, they have to pay full price for air tickets, as well as of each passenger name, on purchase. This has caused difficulty for preparation since many tourists register only a short time before tours.
Moreover, some travel agents such as Vietravel, Fiditour, and Hanoi Red Tour have difficulty meeting tourists’ demands since the number of air tickets bought is limited. Besides, the cooperation between airline and tourism agents is very loose. As for airlines, they lack information from travel agents and Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, especially detailed information on big promotion programmes.
“Engine” for development
Ms Kim Dung, management representative from Vietnam Travel Channel Limited Company, said that at the moment, airlines should offer preferences for tourists groups of travel agents by, for example, paying 30 percent of ticket price in advance, and allowing passenger name confirmation later. In case tourists cancel the tour, travel agents still have to pay the deposit. This will help travel agents attract tourists and strengthen airlines’ business.
To create an “engine” to help both parties win trust for long term development, travel agents have to actively propose detailed cooperation contents, and build up plans for each campaign and market, as well as general plans.
The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism and Vietnam Airlines are preparing contents for cooperation from 2011 to 2015. There focus is on contents such as holding farm trips, press trips to boost communication and advertising on Vietnam tourism, communicating big campaigns, and advertising for Vietnam tourism and Vietnam Airlines.
Mr Nguyen Van Tuan states that to have a fair and equal competitive environment among airlines, as well as connection between travel agents and airlines, the government should find a suitable and flexible price mechanism. Equality among parties joining, even between national airlines charged with routes making a loss to serve economic development in remote areas and airlines which purely operate for profit, or nationally funded and private airlines, should be ensured. In the shadow of ceiling price control, clear division, accurate and adequate calculation on cost for firms’ operation is the way to create the fairest environment and best engine for development.
From an expert’s point of view, Mr Ha Van Sieu, Chairman of the Institute for Tourism Development Research, indicated that Vietnam will not be able to witness good cooperation between airlines and tourism when the airline market is still in a “monopoly” status. Therefore, friendly cooperation between travel agents and airlines will be the engine for sustainable and long term development.
Vietnamese
