Will visa waivers help Thailand’s tourism regain pre-pandemic levels?

[webfact]

File photo : PM Srettha Thavisin greets Chinese tourists at Suvarnabhumi Airport last year.

Thai tourists are excited at the permanent visa-free agreement signed by Thailand and China, which would make travel for citizens of both countries easy, with large-scale implications for tourism.

 

Chairat Trairattanacharatporn, a former chairman of the Tourism Council of Thailand, sees the arrangement as offering enormous convenience to Thai passport holders when the permanent visa-free agreement comes into force on March 1.

 

The Thai government had started the ball rolling soon after it came to power last year by granting visa exemption to Chinese travelers until February 29.

 

But once China too came on board, the two governments decided to do away with visas for travel by their nationals from March 1.

 

“At least we can save about 2,000 to 3,000 baht in the cost of visa application,” said Chairat, who plans to visit China on March 2.

 

Not needing a visa is also a huge time saver, he says, adding that he often makes trips to China for business and travel. He runs a resort in Baan Pe in Rayong province on Thailand’s Eastern coast.

 

Visa-waiver a giant step

 

The visa-free agreement is seen as helping win back the confidence of Chinese tourists after they had previously carried a negative view of personal safety in Thailand.

 

Chairat says his resort business is benefiting greatly from the rising number of Chinese and European tourists.

 

He observed that Chinese tourists who were free independent travelers (FIT) still maintained a high level of spending power though old people spent less.

 

Sarapee, the owner of View Point Travel Agency Service in Koh Tao, in Thailand’s southern Surat Thani province, said a rising number of Thai travelers were booking air tickets with her for visiting China following the new visa waiver policy.

 

As more people book flights to China, the air ticket price is also rising, she said.

 

Full story: Thai PBS 2024-03-02

 

- Cigna offers a range of visa-compliant plans that meet the minimum requirement of medical treatment, including COVID-19, up to THB 3m. For more information on all expat health insurance plans click here.

 

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[rct99q]

From Canada so we get 30 days anyway upon arrival.

 

Biggest drawbacks will be seat availability. More flights are needed. From West coast of North America would be nice to see more flights via China. Helps keep price down. 

 

There is plenty of advertising in Canada for Thai Holidays, so don't think that will be an issue. Lots of students still consider Thailand in the top three places to go. USA & Mexico are the other two. Europe the past two years has flatlined it seems. 

 

So little of the negative news seems to filter down to the everyday traveller. 

 

Will numbers bounce back? I think so. People will always consider it a popular destination. Young kids will always consider it an exciting and inexpensive option. So I'm optimistic.

 

 

 

[hotchilli]

4 hours ago, webfact said:

Thai tourists are excited at the permanent visa-free agreement signed by Thailand and China, which would make travel for citizens of both countries easy, with large-scale implications for tourism.

So why are the projected numbers not coming from China?

[kinyara]

5 hours ago, hotchilli said:

So why are the projected numbers not coming from China?

 

They are. The 8 million projected/estimated for 2024 equates to 21,858 per day, in February the daily rate had risen to 21,526 according to the numbers reported by the Minister of Tourism the other day. The numbers keep improving month on month. 

 

[Barnet1900]

I don't ever recall getting a visa as an influence on where I holiday. Obviously travelling somewhere that doesn't permit me in, for a holiday, would sway it but North Korea has never been in the brochure sadly.

 

The state of the country, safety, weather, attitude of the people and always cost are the only concerns. I don't recall the Chinese negative experiences having anything to do with visas. More about what they experience once they're through the airport.

 

The Chinese will travel as their economy picks up. Nothing to do with Thai visa regulations at all.

 

This whole visafree travel is a smokescreen over the real determiners in travelling anywhere, not just Thailand.

[Blumpie]

7 hours ago, hotchilli said:

So why are the projected numbers not coming from China?

Financially they have serious problems in China.  And with Chinese they are hard working and take fiscal responsibility very seriously.  That's why you won't see them spending opulently on a vacation when they are not doing well.  They tend to hunker down and thats what they are doing.

Like it or not, tourism means something much different to this board.  An expat coming for six months is not the same as a tourist spending a week blowing their load of cash.  You would have to be stupid not to go after those people and that's what everyone wants.  

Of course watching poorly educated fools try to figure this all out is good fodder for us who watch the industry, but they will learn very very very slowly.  The result of all these broken promises will be a sense of apathy from the ocean that they serve (the people) only deepening.  It's the way things go in corrupt countries and little is ever done about it.  

Not my problem.

[DonniePeverley]

They had massive tourist numbers last year, when you compare it to the rest of the world. 

 

The first two months of the year show they are going to be back and break pre pandemic visitors. 

 

Getting rid of visa fees and waivers was done in too much of a panic, and has been a needless massive cost that is barely been spoken about. Chinese visitors have began resuming to normal all around the world over the past few months, the visa waiver has made no difference whether they would have come or not. Of course it will be spun as 'the visa waiver' is the reason they are returning, but that is just not the case. 

 

How many visitors are Thailand looking at ? They will smash through 40-50 million this year. What do they want - 60-80 million ? 

 

You try to move around the roads on Phuket and it's a gridlock. You better then make sure you do some prior investment in infrustructure before allowing this. Airports are jammed to the queues. 

 

Furthermore, what happened to quality tourists over quantity ? It seems the leadership is purely focussed on the overrall number, regardless whether it's good spending tourists or not. It's a very naive approach, i predict within a year the locals will start to become angry at the volume of tourists taking over. 

 

You already have local thai's furious they are being priced out of flights to move around the country as tourists take over. 

 

The decision to allow Russians to stay longer is deeply controversial. Again, it's barely mentioned by the media, but they've pushed rental prices up so high, creating a bubble. Will they return nack to Russia after the war? If so, what happens to these properties they are renting out and have inflated the prices. It's meant many local Thai's have been pushed out further in the housing market. 

 

There are so many issues in Thailand - inequality, education, pollution, policing, exports, yet the overall focus on tourism is just far too much. 

 

 

Edited March 2 by DonniePeverley

[Gknrd]

Thailand is dying on the vine. 10 years max then massive decline.

[BayArea]

3 hours ago, DonniePeverley said:

They had massive tourist numbers last year, when you compare it to the rest of the world. 

 

The first two months of the year show they are going to be back and break pre pandemic visitors. 

 

Getting rid of visa fees and waivers was done in too much of a panic, and has been a needless massive cost that is barely been spoken about. Chinese visitors have began resuming to normal all around the world over the past few months, the visa waiver has made no difference whether they would have come or not. Of course it will be spun as 'the visa waiver' is the reason they are returning, but that is just not the case. 

 

How many visitors are Thailand looking at ? They will smash through 40-50 million this year. What do they want - 60-80 million ? 

 

You try to move around the roads on Phuket and it's a gridlock. You better then make sure you do some prior investment in infrustructure before allowing this. Airports are jammed to the queues. 

 

Furthermore, what happened to quality tourists over quantity ? It seems the leadership is purely focussed on the overrall number, regardless whether it's good spending tourists or not. It's a very naive approach, i predict within a year the locals will start to become angry at the volume of tourists taking over. 

 

You already have local thai's furious they are being priced out of flights to move around the country as tourists take over. 

 

The decision to allow Russians to stay longer is deeply controversial. Again, it's barely mentioned by the media, but they've pushed rental prices up so high, creating a bubble. Will they return nack to Russia after the war? If so, what happens to these properties they are renting out and have inflated the prices. It's meant many local Thai's have been pushed out further in the housing market. 

 

There are so many issues in Thailand - inequality, education, pollution, policing, exports, yet the overall focus on tourism is just far too much. 

 

 

They focused on tourism above everything else ( even though they claimed its only 20% of the GNP) because it's easier to tackle than real problems plaguing the country which actually requires them to apply critical thinking something they avoid with utmost prejudice! Not too mentioned,  tourists revenue generate quick and tangible results they can actually see.

[Mike Lister]

1 hour ago, BayArea said:

They focused on tourism above everything else ( even though they claimed its only 20% of the GNP) because it's easier to tackle than real problems plaguing the country which actually requires them to apply critical thinking something they avoid with utmost prejudice! Not too mentioned,  tourists revenue generate quick and tangible results they can actually see.

I don't think that's quite accurate.

 

Tourism (International is 12% of GDP whereas Domestic Tourism is around 9%) increases consumer spending at the grass roots level, the income helps with consumer debt and keeps the population happier. Everyone wants to know about tourism because that's money in the pockets of small business. On the other hand, exports of Goods and Services is over 60% of GDP but that's less sexy because it involves factories and the hourly wage and production facilities and other mostly boring stuff, not exactly interesting headline news for the average citizen. Citizens get excited at the prospect of big spending foreign tourists who will visit, less so that some foreign country they've never heard of is buying a container load of widgets. Effort wise and in economics terms, the container of widgets is the big news.

[BayArea]

20 minutes ago, Mike Lister said:

I don't think that's quite accurate.

 

Tourism (International is 12% of GDP whereas Domestic Tourism is around 9%) increases consumer spending at the grass roots level, the income helps with consumer debt and keeps the population happier. Everyone wants to know about tourism because that's money in the pockets of small business. On the other hand, exports of Goods and Services is over 60% of GDP but that's less sexy because it involves factories and the hourly wage and production facilities and other mostly boring stuff, not exactly interesting headline news for the average citizen. Citizens get excited at the prospect of big spending foreign tourists who will visit, less so that some foreign country they've never heard of is buying a container load of widgets. Effort wise and in economics terms, the container of widgets is the big news.

Thx for the long unabridged version of my original post. Lol!!

[Mike Lister]

10 minutes ago, BayArea said:

Thx for the long unabridged version of my original post. Lol!!

You're welcome! 

 

You understand these things but others do not, I thought it was useful to perhaps explain it at a more detailed level.