MACAU has relaxed entry regulations for transit visitors from mainland China, allowing them to stay up to seven days.

Effective since July 1, mainland passport holders are allowed to enjoy seven instead of five days of visit when transiting Macau, if they did not enter the city in the previous 30 days.

Those who violate the new transit regulation will now be granted two days of stay, up from one, if they enter Macau again on a transit visa within 30 days.

Las Vegas Sands & Sands China’s global chief marketing officer, Dave Horton, welcomed opportunities for guests to stay longer in their properties, especially since “a vast majority” of its patrons hail from mainland China.

Cooper Zhang, manager of CITS Macau, international department, found this new policy positive to inbound travel.

He said: “As a tour company, we don’t benefit much from these transit visitors because they mostly come to gamble. However, the longer they stay, the more money they’ll spend in Macau. This would benefit hotels which suffer low occupancy rate in recent months.”

“Mainland Chinese may feel good about the relaxation but it’s definitely not a main reason to drive them to come more,” said Andy Wu, managing director of Gray Line Tours.

“I personally don’t see a big surge in arrivals, given existing factors like the anti-corruption practice by the Chinese government and the recent stock market slump,” he added.

Meanwhile, it remains to be seen if the revised policy will boost mainland tourist arrivals.

Said a spokesman from the Tourism Research Centre of the Institute for Tourism Studies: “Even if we find a recovery of tourist numbers from the mainland, it may only be the summer holiday effect, rather than an outcome of the policy relaxation. To conclude if it really helps, we need a longer observation period.

THE Peninsula Hotels’ two new projects in Yangon and London are in the design phase, with the former expected to open in three years and the latter in five.

The Yangon property is the former headquarters of the Burma Railway Building, an elegant colonial building and one of the most distinctive buildings in Yangon. Plans are to preserve and restore the existing structure and redevelop it into an 80-room Peninsula hotel.

The Peninsula London is being developed on a 1.5-acre site opposite the gardens of Buckingham Palace and overlooking Hyde Park.

Details are still sketchy, with The Peninsula Hotels’ regional vice president and general manager, The Peninsula Hong Kong, Rainy Chan, in Singapore for a media update, saying the group is consolidating the design concepts for the Yangon project and designing the facade for the London hotel, a new-build, which in London requires a lot of approvals at each stage.

On which other destination gaps the group hopes to fill, Chan said: “In terms of global profile, our need was more in Europe, as we didn’t have a presence until The Peninsula Paris opened (in August last year). London will continue to build on our global portfolio.

“So now we have six properties in Asia, three in the US and six in Europe. I wouldn’t say there’s a tremendous gap, rather, a desire or a wish to have a hotel in India eventually. Our chairman (Michael Kadoorie) and his family lived in India before they moved to Asia and they always have a strong emotion tied to India. India and Shanghai were his roots. He waited 15 years for Shanghai.”

She added: “We are selective; all our hotels are owned and managed by us, so it’s a huge investment while commitment of resources is another (factor). We are a small hotel company and we take things slowly. With two projects under our belt, we’re quite busy.”

ENCOURAGED by a weakening Australian dollar, more Singaporeans have made Australia their go-to destination in recent months.

Some of Singapore’s biggest outbound specialists have reported an uptick in bookings for holidays Down Under.

CTC Travel’s vice president of marketing and PR, Sylvia Tan, said the company has observed an increase of approximately 20 per cent in bookings, while Alicia Seah, director of marketing communications, Dynasty Travel, noted a 20-25 per cent rise in “leisure and business travellers during the winter months of May to July 2015”.

“Over the last two weeks, we have observed a rise in last-minute bookings to Australia, departing in end July and August,” said Jane Chang, assistant manager of marketing communications with Chan Brothers Travel.

The agency saw a five to 10 per cent year-on-year increase in bookings for Australia during the recent June school holidays.

Forward bookings for the year-end holidays are expected to shine too.

“This (fall in value of the Australian dollar) will definitely push some forward bookings for the second half of 2015 and the upward trend will continue to surge with greater demand from travellers,” Seah added.

The Australian dollar has fallen about eight per cent against the Singapore dollar since the start of the year and about 17 per cent since July 2015.

By Samuel Ng

GLOBAL search engine Skyscanner’s move to expand its business into the hotel and car hire search space and launch of a travel industry intelligence service has boosted its non-flights contribution to overall revenues by 47 per cent in 2014.

The metasearch company, which is best known for its proprietary flight search product, launched its first hotel and car hire apps in over 30 languages globally last year. It also debuted Skyscanner for Business in 2014, a new service that provides travel data, insights and online traffic monetisation services to the travel industry.

As a result, Skyscanner reported an annual turnover of 93 million pounds (US$143 million) for 2014.

Shane Corstorphine, the group’s chief financial officer, described 2014 as a “transformational” year for the company, with record numbers of visits to its website and apps.

According to Skyscanner, the number of unique users to the website each month stands at 35 million.

Corstorphine stated in a press release: “Our primary focus for the year has been investing for future growth, and this approach has been making an impact for us sooner than anticipated.

“While our revenues continue to be led primarily by flights, the addition of new hotel and car hire products, as well as the creation of our Skyscanner for Business, has had a key role to play in our growth,” he said.

Speaking to TTG Asia eDaily, Pamela Knaggs, the group’s marketing manager for Singapore and Malaysia, said: “Our brand is moving from flights to travel as there is a demand for hotels and car hires. There is great potential there.

“However, there is still a lack of awareness as some think we are just a provider of flights. We will be running more PR activities to ensure that people know we are more than just a flight brand now,” Knaggs added.

Skyscanner, headquartered in Edinburgh, currently has nine global offices, with an office in Singapore, Beijing and Shenzhen for the Asia-Pacific region.

WITH international tourism demand enjoying strong growth between January and April this year, arrivals for the May-August period are expected to remain bullish, according to the latest UNWTO World Tourism Barometer.

Destinations worldwide received some 332 million international tourists during this period, a growth of four per cent from last year.

The Americas recorded the highest growth with a six per cent rise in arrivals. Europe, the world’s most visited region, enjoyed continued strength with international arrivals rising by five per cent.

Asia-Pacific’s arrivals grew by four per cent, with Oceania and North-east Asia leading with eight and five per cent respectively. South-east Asia’s arrivals grew by a modest three per cent, as the 25 per cent rebound in Thailand was offset by declines in other destinations.

International arrivals in the Middle East are up by four per cent, further continuing the region’s recovery, which started in 2014, after three consecutive years of declines. Africa’s tourist numbers declined by about six per cent, a result caused mainly by the Ebola outbreak.

Close to 500 million tourists are estimated to travel abroad between this May and August and prospects continue to be optimistic for this period, according to the UNWTO Tourism Confidence Index.

Business intelligence tools ForwardKeys shows healthy growth in international air travel reservations for this period, with overall bookings up five per cent. Air reservations increased most in Asia-Pacific, the Americas and Europe.

UNWTO expects international tourist arrivals to grow by three to four per cent for the full year 2015.

INCREASING volcanic activity on Indonesia’s Mount Raung has forced five airports in Indonesia to shut, while airlines have been urged to fly higher or away from cities affected by ash clouds since the eruptions began.

The Ministry of Transportation today issued a notice to airmen (NOTAM) announcing the closure of Bali Ngurah Rai International Airport, Lombok International Airport, Selaparang Airport Lombok, Blimbingsari Airport Banyuwangi and Notohadinegoro Airport Jember.

Mount Raung, located in the province of East Java, has rumbled back to life since end-June, spewing ash and causing visibility issues.

I Gusti Ngurah Ardita, general manager of Angkasa Pura 1 airport authority, told online news site Liputan6.com that 16 flights from Australia to Bali were cancelled yesterday.

With the NOTAM in place, Garuda Indonesia said a total of 112 flights from Denpasar, Jember and Lombok have been cancelled today. Routes between Denpasar and Melbourne, Sydney, Perth, Narita (Tokyo), Kansai (Osaka), Seoul, Hong Kong and Singapore, are affected.

Domestic services are hit too, with flights between Denpasar and Jakarta, Surabaya, Jogjakarta, Labuan Bajo being disrupted. Lombok-Surabaya and Denpasar-Surabaya services have grinded to a halt.

Bali Hotels Association (BHA), which represents more than 130 hotels in Bali, has released guidelines to ease the burdens of travellers affected by the eruption.

“For passengers who need to extend their stay, the Best Available Rate should be proposed when requests are made directly to the hotel. For bookings that are made through a third party, contracted rates apply.

“For passengers that cannot come to Bali or will arrive later than original dates booked, BHA members are recommended to accept, at no charge, to re-book their stay (based on availability and rates during new requested period) until end of 2015,” the guideline reads.

Jean-Charles Le Coz, vice-chairman of BHA, said: “Bali Hotels Association looks forward to a better situation that will allow all travellers to enjoy their trip to and from the island in a non-disruptive environment.”

IATA said the industry will have to wait-and-see if the Lufthansa Group (LHG)’s move to impose a surcharge on all bookings made through intermediaries, effective September, is going to be a standard airline practice. GDSs meanwhile have lashed out that the model penalises both travel agencies and consumers.

“It’s a response to the issue that Lufthansa and many other airlines have that the distribution cost in this industry is very high and they are seeking to incentivise their customers to use channels which save them money. That seems to be the perfectly-rational thing to do. Whether they’ll be successful, or whether the other airlines will follow their example, we’ll have to wait and see,” said IATA director-general and CEO, Tony Tyler, when asked for his views on the fee at a media roundtable in Singapore.

Although other airlines are not jumping yet to follow suit, GDSs are up in arms over the fee.

Amadeus, in assessing the impact, said: “LHG has chosen to go in a different direction by introducing charges that will penalise travellers based on the shopping channel they use. Travellers will either pay more for the same service or, in the case that travel agencies are forced to accept this new commercial strategy by modifying the way they access content just for LHG, there will be extra IT costs that may ultimately be passed on to the traveller, putting the travel agency, and/or the end consumer, at a disadvantage.

“Also, this new model will make comparison and transparency more difficult because travellers will now be forced to go to multiple channels to search for the best fares. Ultimately, the industry overall stands to lose from this distribution model.”

Travelport’s spokesman said: “This proposed surcharge is not in the interests of either the end-traveller or the airline group.”

LHG’s 16 euro (US$18) surcharge on all bookings made through intermediaries applies to bookings on all airlines in the group, including Brussels Airlines and Germanwings.