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‘High spending long haul visitors staying away’ – UKinbound
The UK will continue to lose high spending visitors due to high tourist taxes and operating costs, industry body UKinbound has warned.
Despite a strong September which saw arrivals grow by 8.3% for the organisation’s 290 members – lifting growth in the first nine months of the year to 2.46% – UKinbound sounded a note of caution.
In the groups’ Business Barometer covering September, UKinbound pointed out that most of the increase in tourists was coming from the European short break sector with long haul arrivals showing little, if any, growth.
This combined with the weakness of the US dollar continues to dampen demand.
“There seems little prospect of this changing in the short to medium term,” UKinbound said. “However, it is only part of the problem as the UK continues to achieve lower than the global average of inbound tourism growth.”
But the organisation gave a thinly veiled attack on government policy for the tourism sector.
While the UK remains a “must see” destination for much of the world, the continued erosion of the country’s competitiveness through high tourist taxes and operating costs in a price competitive, commodity business, “means we have lost and will continue to lose customers to destinations with more favourable business environment,” UKinbound said.
“The expansion of the UK short-break market is most welcome but we must be under no illusion that it brings the same level of revenue to our businesses or economic benefit to our country as the high spending, long haul visitors who are staying away.”
Report by Phil Davies
Phil Davies
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