Australian hotels need to do more work accommodating Chinese tourists
Chinese tourism to Australia is booming.
China is now Australia’s biggest source of international visitors.
But according to a study released yesterday, Australian hotels are just not ready.
Hotels.com research showed that while Australia was last year ranked as the No 1 destination for Chinese in the 12 months ahead, it has slumped this year to be the third most popular destination after France and the US.
The problem for Chinese travellers is that Australian hotels are not employing enough Mandarin speaking in-house staff. Only 16 per cent of Australian offer that.
There is also a lack of Chinese payment facilities at Australian hotels. It’s offered by only 18 per cent of hotels.
And strangely enough, despite the demand for Chinese restaurants, only a handful of Australian hotels, three per cent to be precise, offer that service for Chinese tourists. And only 5 per cent are looking at providing one within the next 12 months.
Hotels.com marketing manager David Spasovic told The Australian that Australian hotels were focusing on social media and marketing programs to attract Chinese.
However, only 5 per cent planned to spend more than $US10,000 on Chinese-related tourism infrastructure over the next 12 months.
Former Tourism Australia and Tourism Queensland chairman Don Morris said Australian hoteliers needed to look at the demographics of the Chinese market in order to cater to it.
He said 57 per cent of Chinese travellers were female and largely millennials.
“Most hotels have made significant changes to move in this direction,’’ Mr Morris told The Australian.
“The bottom line is fundamentally to do with females, who are much younger. They are very demanding in their requirements for cultural immersions and living like a local.”
He said Chinese tourists also wanted Chinese mobile check-in. They didn’t have to queue up in reception “like an ox”.
And they want specific financial facilities such as Alipay.
by Leon Gettler, July 18th 2017
