POLAND is proving to be the new Russia and IT&CMA sellers are making a beeline for the record number of 27 Polish buyers who are present at the show this year.

Virat Chatturaputpitak, managing director, Marwin Tours (Thailand), said: “In the past, most Polish groups came to Thailand for leisure. Nowadays most are on incentive programmes.”

Marwin Tours has three to four Polish incentive groups this year, each with 100-500 delegates, staying six to seven nights.

Polish incentives are also growing for Thailand’s Creative Destination Management (CDM), which is handling 10 groups from Poland this year, up from five groups two years ago.

For Suwadee Pachariyangkun, managing director of Universal Travel Link & Services Thailand, the Polish incentive market is as big as the Russian incentive market. “We started tapping Poland last year and have already scored 10 groups,” she said.

Indonesia is also eyeing Polish incentive groups. Smailing Tours is handling three incentive groups from the market this year and has four to six potential ones lined up for 2012, while Bali DMC Plus has three confirmed groups in 2012.

Explaining Poland’s strong outbound incentive potential, Andrzej Tkaczow, office & sales director of Warsaw-based Luxury Travel, said the country was not affected by the financial crisis in Europe. “Even though Poland is part of the European Union, it has its own currency (the Polish zloty),” he said.

Thailand is favoured during the winter months of October to March, while Bali is hot from June to August, as it escapes the Asian monsoon season, according to Tkaczow.

– Read more in IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific Official Daily – Day 3 issue

THAILAND has hiked its visa fee for Indian nationals, catching Thai sellers at IT&CMA by surprise while Indian MICE buyers, who are aware of the move, roundly criticise it.

Coming after a visa fee waiver from 2009 till March this year, implemented to mitigate the impact of Thailand’s political riots, Indian buyers warn the hike will impact MICE business to Thailand. The new fee, effective October 1, is 2,000 rupees (US$40) per person and comes up to 2,350 rupees including processing charges. Previously, it was 1,400 rupees.

Indian buyers the Daily spoke to were aware of the fee increase because of a circular sent out by the Thai embassy in India just prior to IT&CMA, explaining that the adjustments were made “due to the cumulative changes in foreign exchange rates, and may be adjusted periodically in the future”.

Anshuman Mitra, director, New Delhi-based Starlite DMC, said: “The visa fee increase creates a lot of pressure on us as MICE operators into Thailand. Maybe the leisure arrivals won’t be affected, but I am 100 per cent certain that the MICE market from India will be hit. The visa fee is crucial in terms of overall costs, since MICE groups tend to be quite large compared to leisure.

“The visa fee waiver over the last few years was the biggest advantage Thailand had to attract markets like India. Other governments like Singapore, Malaysia and Macau are not raising visa fees. In fact, compared to Thailand, some of them are actually paying us subsidies to bring Indian MICE into their destinations.”

Mitra said concern was already pouring in from MICE clients scheduled for Thailand. “The extra cost is almost equivalent to the rate for a roomnight in Bangkok.”

Representatives from Onyx Hospitality Group’s Amari brand of hotels tried to paint a positive picture.

Amari Watergate Bangkok general manager, Pierre-Andre Pelletier, said: “Despite the hike, Thailand is still value for money. We have a lot of good connections between India and Thailand, and there are plenty of opportunities for MICE here.”

– Read more in IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific Official Daily – Day 3 issue

GBTA’S plans to expand its presence in Asia last year was foiled by the abrupt departure of Mark Rizutto, who left the organisation almost as soon as his appointment as managing director for Asia-Pacific was announced at the last IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific in Bangkok.

Hank Roeder, vice president of chapter relations for GBTA, declined to divulge the reasons behind the sudden turn of events. “Sometimes things just don’t work out. He (Rizutto) left almost immediately, so we continued looking, and have been actively searching for a replacement since then,” Roeder said.

Rizutto, in an email to the Daily, said: “Put simply, there was basically a difference in ideas around strategic priorities for the Asia-Pacific region.”

According to Roeder, GBTA is “very close” to assigning a replacement, who will resume efforts to boost the association’s footprint in Asian markets such as Singapore, China, Hong Kong and Thailand, as well as lead operations in Australia/New Zealand, where GBTA has an existing office.

Meanwhile, GBTA has rebranded its education offerings with the launch of the GBTA Academy in August, an umbrella institution for its suite of new business travel management courses.

The academy’s educational certificate programme will be offered in three distinct tiers – associate, manager and leader. This will replace a number of its courses such as Corporate Travel Expert, Sports Travel Professional/Sports Business Travel Professional, Certified Corporate Travel Executive and Strategic Meetings Management Certification, which are being discontinued.

– Read more in IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific Official Daily – Day 2 issue

INCREASED direct flights between Koh Samui and Singapore are expected to grease the way for more meeting and incentive traffic from the city-state to the southern Thai island, which draws mostly high-end leisure travellers.

SilkAir launched a thrice-weekly Singapore-Samui service from September 27 on top of its codeshare arrangement with Bangkok Airways’ daily flight on the same route. The Airbus A319, which provides business and economy class seats, is used by both airlines.

SilkAir has plans to raise frequencies to five flights a week from the year-end.

Singapore-based Fortune Travel manager, Gwen Ong, expects to convert incentive and meeting enquiries into confirmed bookings with SilkAir’s new flights. She said enquiries often stopped short at the quotation stage due to high airfares from Bangkok Airways.

Singapore’s Euro-Asia Holidays director, Maggie Tay, said SilkAir dangled an introductory fare of S$130 (US$99), excluding tax and fuel surcharges of around S$120, until end September, while Bangkok Airways kept its fares at S$320.

Ong hoped SilkAir would continue to be aggressive with its pricing strategy. “Bangkok Airways will feel the heat (and lower its price), which will help us to confirm more meetings and incentives to Koh Samui,” she said.

However, Bangkok Airways sales manager-South-east Asia and Indian Ocean, Sutee Yongudomkit, said there were no plans to reduce fares on that route. He explained that the route was lucrative and that it was normal for SilkAir to enter the market with an attractive price offer.

THE COST of business travel from Asia to the US has surged, making it harder for corporate travel managers to secure good deals from airlines and hotels.

Airfares from China to the US have risen substantially in the last two years, noted
Jackie Teo, corporate travel manager of management consulting firm McKinsey & Company Shanghai.

A business class ticket on United Airlines or Continental Airlines, which cost RMB30,000 (US$4,706) in the past, is now RMB40,000, she said.

Dean Fowles, principal, travel & expense management, global sourcing-services, Rio Tinto, explained that volatile fuel prices and multiple global financial crises forced airlines to take a harder look at the way they run their businesses.

“Earnings have become more important and there is added emphasis on revenue,” he said. “Compared to before, airlines aren’t slashing prices to fill seats. Leisure travellers may still get great deals from airlines, but corporate travellers aren’t getting anything like they used to.”

Fowles added that contraction of air capacity in and out of the US with the two recent major American carrier mergers (United Airlines and Continental Airlines; Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines) had also affected the competitive rates of the past.

Margaret Li, director, procurement-Asia for American leather goods company Coach, agreed, pointing out that airfare discounts have fallen from 40-50 per cent to 10-15 per cent.

As a result, the burgeoning airfares have forced at least one company – McKinsey & Company Shanghai – to pressure hotels in the US for better rates in order to keep costs down.

The problem is, room rates in the US are also rising, with rates for a standard room leaping from US$100 several years ago to US$250 today, said Catty Yun, senior manager, global procurement, finance department of National Basketball Association (NBA) China.

Pricier multiple-entry business travel visas into the US are also to blame, said corporates.

Niranjan Phatak, manager-travel & immigration services, HSBC India, said the cost of these visas had risen from US$600-700 to about US$2,000 over the last two years.

As corporates cannot avoid travelling to the US for business meetings, the incentive market is the one bearing the brunt.

McKinsey’s Teo said incentives to the US have been shifted to Hong Kong and Singapore.

– Read more in IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific Official Daily – Day 2 issue

ASIAN corporate travel has hit the amber light as companies begin to scale back on trips in view of the global economic uncertainty, which caused stock markets to plunge again yesterday and Monday.

Corporate travel buyers interviewed at the show said while trips had not been completely red-lighted, they had definitely hit the amber light at this juncture.

The head of procurement Asia-Pacific of a Hong Kong-based financial firm told the Daily that his company had, since July, placed a “freeze” on all travel except essential ones.

“Although I can’t cite figures, the drop is significant,” said the manager, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to company policy.

The last time his company froze travel except essential ones, and even enforced economy class-only on essential travel, was in 2008, he said. “It would never come to no travel at all; there is no such thing. But, because of the lack of confidence in the market, we are getting prepared for the worst,” he said.

“If it gets worse, the next step is to enforce economy class-only on essential travel, as we did in 2008.”

The global category manager-travel global sourcing of a financial firm based in Singapore, who also requested anonymity, said: “I know for a fact that a lot of companies in the region are asking their employees to cut down on travel. Companies will be announcing their latest quarter results soon and you’ll see many are not meeting their numbers. Consequently, corporate travel will be affected. Internally, I know many have announced cuts, especially those in manufacturing, R&D, etc, which are not profit-driven sectors.”

Mediacorp Singapore assistant vice president-administration, Loong Chow Jin, said the broadcasting firm was cutting down on travel spend. The number of people sent for overseas training or meetings, for example, has been trimmed to 15 people, from 20 people, and fewer staff are going on overseas trips to acquire programmes.

“We started cutting back two months ago, but it has not come to the point when everyone – including the VPs (and higher-ranking staff) who travel business class for trips of more than seven hours – must travel on economy.”

– Read more in IT&CMA and CTW Asia-Pacific Official Daily – Day 2 issue