Christmas/New Year was very busy and January is holding up well and wasn’t too affected by cancellations is the message coming from Samantha Muspratt, Director of Sales & Marketing for Malolo Island Fiji & Likuliku Lagoon Resort Fiji.
She told the Mole, “January is holding well and is being assisted by the specials and while February March and April are a little slow, we are anticipating the specials to assist,” adding, “Our forward bookings from then one are slightly below this time last year, but we are confident that they will pick up.”
Samantha also told The Mole, “Aussies and Kiwis are still travelling here in about the same numbers, with Kiwis down just a tad, but picking up and the UK/USA a little slow on the uptake with a number of initial cancellations due to the level of travel warnings especially out of UK and these were insurance related”.
The Mole asked Samantha for her views on the travel advisors and she said “When New Zealand downgraded their travel advisories, bookings picked up, but the Australian Government travel advisory is ridiculous.”
“Fiji has a higher level advisory than Thailand, despite bomb blasts in the capital.”
“Also when the Tongan capital was burning and people were being killed, Tonga only had a ‘high degree of caution’ level against Fiji’s current ‘reconsider your need to travel’.
“This absolutely overstated and bordering on mischievous especially when all is peaceful.”
Samantha added, “One wonders how these travel advisories are assessed because there is no consistency”.
The Mole will be visiting Malolo next week so look out for our Special Reports!
A Special Fiji Report by The Mole
