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UKinbound: Business confidence back to pre-pandemic levels
UKinbound has released results that show business confidence has now reached pre-pandemic levels.
The association’s Q1 Business Barometer Member Survey, complied by Qa Research, indicates that 56% of inbound tourism businesses are confident about bookings, visitor revenue and customer orders for the next 12 months, a figure not recorded since July 2019.
The results come following last week’s removal of all restrictions for vaccinated international arrivals into the UK.
Vaccinated arrivals are no longer required to take a Covid-19 test pre-departure or on arrival in the UK.
However, although confidence across the inbound tourism industry is returning, 2022 bookings are not expected to reach pre-pandemic levels for most businesses this year.
The survey revealed that business in Q1 is expected to be down for almost four in five inbound tourism businesses .
It finds 78% of businesses expect bookings/visitor numbers/customer orders for Q1 2022 to be lower than the same time pre-pandemic
January – March revenue is expected to be down by an average of 67%.
Spring/summer business is expected to be down 46%.
Joss Croft, CEO, UKinbound said "After a two-year hiatus it’s fantastic that business confidence is finally returning, and that the UK is now open for business. Our members are eager to welcome back international visitors start trading their way to recovery, but we can’t let confidence levels mask reality. 2022 is going to be tough."
Inbound tourism businesses have taken on huge debts during the pandemic and our research shows that revenue this year will still be significantly down on 2019."
In 2019 the UK welcomed 40.8 million international visitors to the UK, who contributed £28.4 billion to the UK economy.
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Editor for TravelMole North America and Asia pacific regions. Ray is a highly experienced (15+ years) skilled journalist and editor predominantly in travel, hospitality and lifestyle working with a huge number of major market-leading brands. He has also cover in-depth news, interviews and features in general business, finance, tech and geopolitical issues for a select few major news outlets and publishers.
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