Nanjing: Travel agencies’ low-price tours are just to fool you

Words such as "traveling to a certain place by car" and "walking to a certain place" are mostly deceptive. It is obviously the same tourist route appearing in different travel agency advertisements with different prices. Some even differ by hundreds of dollars. Yesterday, industry insiders engaged in tour guide work in Nanjing revealed the "insider story" to reporters.

Word games make people miserable

“Many travel agencies take advantage of citizens’ greed for cheap and engage in word games.” Chen Wei (pseudonym) works at a medium-sized travel agency in Nanjing. I have been working as a domestic tour guide for exactly 3 years. He said, “It is not uncommon for the quotes of different travel agencies to differ by five to six hundred for the same travel route.” In order to cater to tourists’ greed for cheap, many travel agencies make fuss about itinerary details, attraction content and service standards, such as: Hainan Tour In the itinerary: "Visit Yalong Bay" and "Wander Yalong Bay". Although the itinerary includes a trip to Yalong Bay, the "tour" involves buying a ticket to enter the Yalong Bay Central Square and visit the Shell Museum and the Central Beach, while the "stroll" is just on the seaside. Take a walk. The difference between the two words is that the price of "walking" is lower than that of "touring" in the quotation, but actual tourists want to walk more and see more, so they have to buy Yalong Bay tickets at their own expense. They provided the tour guides with the opportunity to earn kickbacks. After calculating both inside and outside, not only did they not save money, they actually spent a lot more money.

You even save money on tickets for the car tour

“Travel agencies never do business at a loss, no matter how low the price is, they can do it. Of course there is a way to do it.” On Taiping South Road Fangfang (pseudonym), who has been a local tour guide at a small travel agency for four years, said that for example, the Nanjing travel agency that accepts non-local tourists for a classic tour of five cities in East China is "pick up the group before 10 o'clock and visit Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum, Guanboai Square, and Zitongbao". tripod, sacrificial hall, overlooking the scenery of Purple Mountain, visiting the Cemetery Avenue of Zhongshan Scenic Area, and seeing the plum blossom scenery from a distance; traveling by car to Xuanwu Lake, the first lake in Jinling (Hubin Road, smoked willows around the lake, Guanming City Wall); visiting the Cultural Street of the Republic of China , the main gate of the Presidential Palace; visit the Memorial Hall of the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre by the Japanese Invaders; visit the Chinese Brocade Village of the Yunbrocade Research Institute, which is as beautiful as clouds; take a bus tour of the Yangtze River Bridge; visit the Qinhuai Scenic Area, Confucius Temple, and free shopping; free dinner to taste Confucius Temple snacks, night tour of Dongwang Mansion - visiting the garden, drinking tea, admiring the scenery and watching performances (optional)."

Judging from the itinerary, the Nanjing tour is very richly arranged. In fact, the travel agency only paid 36 yuan for the entrance ticket to Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum (the travel agency gave a 10% discount), and the rest was for overlooking the distance and visiting some free attractions by car. There are a lot of rebates for shopping and snacks. The night tour ticket is 50 yuan, and the travel agency takes 15 yuan. The price difference is 35 yuan. Except for the bus fare and lunch, there are not many other expenses, so the external quotation can be 68 yuan/ The price is 58 yuan/person, or even lower. Foreign tourists are exhausted after a day of playing, but in fact they have not achieved the real effect. By analogy, the price for a 5-day tour of 5 cities in East China can be as low as more than 300 yuan per person.

Citizens should learn to “break down” tourism prices

“I teach citizens some useful ways to prevent fraud.” Chen Wei introduced that in fact, Nanjing tourists only need to understand the quotations of travel agencies to be “ It is not easy to "cheat". The cost of tourism generally consists of the following seven items: transportation fees, accommodation fees, meal fees, attraction ticket fees, tour guide service fees, travel accident insurance premiums and other direct costs incurred during the tourism process, that is, tourism Comprehensive service fee.

There are usually three types of prices offered by travel agencies: one is the all-inclusive price, that is, the price of the above seven aspects is included; the other is the half-inclusive price, that is, the travel agency handles part of the money on behalf of the tourists, and the tourists pay for it at the time. Part of the money, such as meal fees, attraction ticket fees, etc.; the third is a small package price, that is, only transportation tickets or hotel reservations for off-site accommodation are provided on behalf of the tourists, and the rest are paid by the tourists themselves. When registering, tourists must ask clearly what is included in the price and what else needs to be paid for by themselves. When traveling in a group, you must be clear about the travel agency's quotations and learn to "take apart" the prices. At present, the profits of travel agencies are relatively transparent. Domestic travel is generally about 3%, and outbound travel is generally about 8%. Relying on long-term cooperative relationships with airlines, tourist destination hotels, and attractions, travel agencies can obtain larger discounts when organizing groups. Part of these discounts is returned to consumers, and the other part becomes the profits of travel agencies. If the various items in the travel itinerary are added up according to the market price, the sum obtained will generally be higher than the travel agency's quotation. If the travel agency's quotation is higher than the sum of the actual market prices, it is "rip off".

Beware of "gangsters" engaging in "guerrilla" activities

"Regular travel agencies in Nanjing generally don't dare to play these tricks, because they have all deposited 100,000 yuan with the tourism bureau. Once a tourist complains and is confirmed by the functional department as an illegal operation, he will be punished and the deposit will be confiscated." Fangfang said that at present, it is some "underworlds" who engage in "cover-up methods" to deceive tourists in Nanjing. , that is, some individuals are engaged in the tourism industry illegally under various banners, but in fact they do not have any qualifications or licenses at all. Most of them rent two rooms in a hotel or office building, and three or five people set up the so-called so-and-so travel agency department (except for the regular travel agency business department). These people often change places, sometimes staying in one place for only a few months before moving, staying a little longer during the peak season and then "evaporating" during the off-season. They take advantage of customers' desire for cheap and keep prices low. The head is then sold to a qualified travel agency to earn the price difference. Anyway, they make a profit, and they are not afraid of complaints at all.