Traveling abroad with a group has become a form of "overseas shopping", forcing tourists to shop and claiming that there are many low price traps for Limba products | products | outbound | group tours | tourists | tour guides | travel agencies | tourism
"Please be quiet before saying 'not paying the fee will kill you'. Recently, a Thai tour guide suspected of forcing Chinese tourists to purchase self funded items that were not included in the original itinerary has attracted social attention.". Many netizens roast that the outbound group tour is not that simple.
With the continuous release of demand for outbound tourism such as business travel, visiting relatives and friends, graduation travel, and summer study tours, the number of outbound tourists has gradually increased in recent years. According to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics, the number of outbound tourists by Chinese residents in the first half of this year reached 109 million, a year-on-year increase of 4.4%.
However, according to interviews with reporters from the Legal Daily, some tourists encounter "people in a dilemma" during their outbound and group tours, with their rights being damaged and facing difficulties in safeguarding their rights. So what are the pitfalls for outbound and group tours, and how should we avoid them?
Tourists who spend money to buy suffer
Being bombarded into a store for shopping
After experiencing a very poor outbound and group tour experience, Limba, who lives in Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province, decided to choose to travel freely when going out in the future. During this year's May Day holiday, Limba and his family reported on the travel app that they had participated in a 5-day 4-night tour of Thailand. "At that time, thinking about going abroad for the first time, it was still more reassuring to report on the tour, and the travel products and prices provided by the travel agency were relatively suitable. After participating in the tour, transportation, accommodation, and other aspects would also be more worry free.".
According to the information provided by the travel agency, this trip includes two shopping points, with a rich itinerary and a promise of no mandatory consumption. After arriving locally, the local agency indirectly forced consumption and shopping, which made Limba very helpless.
"As soon as we finished placing the order, the tour guide sent us three shopping spots." Limba said, "After arriving in Bangkok at 1am, we started collecting landing visas and fast track fees, but it didn't allow us to pass quickly. It was almost 3am when we left the airport. As soon as we got on the bus, the Chinese tour guide asked for tips for him, his Thai assistant, and the driver, and reminded us to prepare tips for the hotels we stayed in every day. It was a 10 minute journey, and the driver drove for 40 minutes."
This is just the beginning. The next day, after leaving the hotel, the Limba family did not go to the tourist attractions as they had hoped. Instead, they took an hour and a half by car to the jewelry shopping center, where the tour guide introduced various gemstones throughout the journey. At the shopping center, Limba saw multiple buses carrying Chinese tourists parked there. Tourists in the group who were not interested in entering to explore gemstones would be bombarded by the tour guide. Two hours later, only Limba was left with a group because no one in their group bought gemstones.
"At this point, the tour guide began to PUA us, saying that with so many tour groups, we bought the least, which was very embarrassing for him. Another female receptionist took us to a crocodile skin product store that was not on the itinerary. After two people in the group bought two belts, the tour guide's face looked better. Our group arrived earliest and left last because no one bought anything," Limba said.
In the afternoon, the tour guide took Limba and his team to the Snake Research Center to see the venomous snakes. The medicine sold inside was as low as 1000 yuan, and several elderly people in the group bought it. Therefore, the afternoon trip ended very early. "On the first day of the trip, I went shopping and didn't see any attractions," Limba said.
The next afternoon, the bus will depart for Pattaya and is expected to travel for two days. On the way there, the tour guide arranged the itinerary for the next two days: first, go to see the human demon show, with a cost of 600 yuan per person; Visit the Dongfang Princess again, each person costs 500 RMB; Then eat bird's nest, 300 yuan per person. "The tour guide asked the people in the car to fill out a form to sign up, but no one signed up and passed the form back. The tour guide began to speak in a strange and unpleasant manner. It was already 10 pm when they arrived at the hotel in Pattaya," Limba recalled.
Faced with the question of why journalists do not protect their rights, Limba bluntly stated: language barriers, long cycles, cumbersome processes, and high costs of protecting their rights.
Some interviewed tourists said that almost all outbound and group tours they have experienced will have shopping spots arranged. Zhao Min, a person from Changsha, Hunan who has traveled to Japan, South Korea, and other places for group tours, said that shopping with group tours is a necessary step, especially in popular destinations. "Although local duty-free goods are relatively cheap, it is difficult to distinguish between genuine and fake.".
The reporter found through interviews that in addition to mandatory shopping, there have been many problems exposed by outbound and group tours in recent years.
In early July this year, Wu Qiang, a native of Hefei, Anhui, signed up for a group tour of France, Italy, and Switzerland. He couldn't even find a restaurant within 10 kilometers of his hotel. During the journey, we traveled an average of 500 kilometers per day, and the bus was driven for two hours to rest for half an hour, with a speed limit of 100 kilometers per hour. Therefore, our daily itinerary is to depart at 7 or 8 o'clock in the morning, sit in the bus for 7 or 8 hours every day, and eat mostly at the highway service area. The arranged bus is old and broken, with tires that are worn out and no patterns, and various self funded additional items.
What if tourists don't buy? Wu Qiang told reporters that in Italy, because he did not participate in the self funded project, nor went to the red hotel, perfume shop to spend money, he was "thrown" by the tour guide in a shop not yet open a few kilometers away from a scenic spot for several hours. He wanted to complain, but found that the travel agency had no official website, no official account, and no customer service phone.
Li Kai, a native of Changshu, Jiangsu, encountered a "second tier trafficker" while traveling abroad with a group tour. Previously, he placed an order for a Japanese boutique small group comfort tour on the travel app. Before making the payment, he repeatedly asked how many people there were in the entire group, and customer service always answered that there were no more than 15 people; After making the payment, he was informed that he had joined a local group tour. When there were many people, there were more than 20 people every day, and almost every day, the tour guide and driver switched. The specific itinerary would not be known until the day before departure.
Li Kai later found out that he had been "sold": he didn't spend money on a tour group, but a "secondary dealer" who sold himself to a local travel agency, and the other party signed up to participate in different local one-day tours every day.
Dong Yuanyuan, Senior Partner of Beijing Tianchi Juntai Law Firm and Director of the Tourism Law Research Association of the Beijing Law Society, said that in response to the issue of "secondary traffickers", in fact, laws and regulations do not prohibit travel agencies from entrusting their licensed business to other qualified third parties to provide services to tourists. However, the Travel Agency Regulations make targeted provisions for the delegation behavior of travel agencies. If a travel agency entrusts its business to other third parties, it must obtain the consent of the tourists, and it should also assume guarantee responsibility for the quality, standards, and fees of the entrusted party's services. It should also bear joint and several liability with the entrusted party for the losses caused by the entrusted party to tourists.
Live streaming with low prices and many tricks
Malicious collusion requires accountability
A reporter's investigation found that many people who encounter "pitfalls" when traveling abroad with group tours have purchased low-priced travel group buying products in the platform's live broadcast room.
At the end of May this year, Lin Ling, a native of Qinhuangdao, Hebei, purchased a comfortable trip to Egypt that was 10000 yuan cheaper than the original price in a live broadcast room. After playing around and returning to China, she found that this seemingly cost-effective trip was actually exceptionally expensive. "There are too many mandatory expenses hidden in the cost statement. For example, the price of 4999 yuan does not include airfare, and you also need to pay 6000 yuan for round-trip airfare, $25 for landing visa, 3000 yuan for single room difference throughout the accommodation, 1000 yuan for driver and tour guide service, and 1000 yuan for domestic round-trip intermodal transportation. Therefore, the calculated price is no different from before the discount."
After carefully studying the tourist route, Lin Ling also discovered other "pitfalls". For example, defining mandatory check-in attractions as self funded projects, and some self funded projects are packaged by tour guides as "must play in this life" or "must go in this life". Moreover, using the information difference to mark prices is expensive, such as a glass boat priced at $80, with an actual market price of around $30; The sea ticket is priced at $70, but in reality it only costs $50.
"The most outrageous is the Abu Simbel Temple. The ticket is 50 yuan. The tour guide directly offered 150 dollars per person, and actually charged 130 dollars per person. The Egypt must go scenic spot Luxor Valley of the Kings, and the $8 ticket charged 65 dollars. As a result, in order to save time to show us the smallest graves, the scenic spots that can be visited in half a day will quickly end the journey in an hour." Lin Ling roast.
The reporter noticed that there are many tourism products in the live broadcast room that claim to be low-priced tours but are actually high in fees. For example, a 6-day 4-night tour of Dubai, with high-quality pure play and zero shopping, including round-trip airfare and national transportation tour groups. The cost statement states that it does not include the service fee for foreign drivers and tour guides, 1000 yuan/person, and the single room difference generated during room allocation is 2000 yuan/person. The cost of telephone, pay TV, luggage handling, beverages, tobacco and alcohol, laundry, and other items must be borne by oneself, which is much more expensive than regular Dubai tourism products. Such tour guide tips, driver service fees, and other additional fees are reflected in tour groups in Europe, Southeast Asia, and other regions. Many anchors either skip or guarantee that other fees are not included in their introductions. Some tourists often mistakenly register due to not paying attention to the relevant information.
It is worth noting that some live streaming room fee details do not include additional fees, and many fees are charged during the journey after the start of the trip. Is the additional cost of overseas group tours reasonable?
Zhang Jing, a lecturer at Hulunbuir College, told reporters that whether additional fees for group tours are reasonable should depend on the specific situation and depend on the agreement between the travel agency and consumers. Travel agencies should clearly define the charging standards and specific service items when entering into contracts with consumers. For additional charged items, they should clearly indicate and truthfully inform consumers. If the travel agency has fulfilled its obligation to truthfully disclose the additional fee items, it is considered reasonable behavior, and vice versa is unreasonable. If the travel agency has already made a promise of no additional fees before and later requires consumers to pay additional fees, it is clearly a breach of contract. The use of sarcasm and threats may also be suspected of illegal or even criminal activities depending on the severity of the situation.
"If the live streaming platform colludes with the travel agency to deliberately promote false information and mislead consumers, the travel agency and the live streaming platform should bear unlimited joint and several liability. If the live streaming platform has conducted due diligence and is deceived by the travel agency and causes losses to travelers, it should bear general joint and several liability." Zhang Jing said that if the anchor of the travel agency has a labor relationship with the travel agency, the responsibility arising from the anchor's performance of duties should still be borne by the travel agency first. If there is no labor relationship, but a contractual relationship of agency promotion, the anchor who maliciously promotes will bear unlimited joint and several liability.
Compliance construction needs to be strengthened
Regulatory guidance needs to be followed up
Why are these problematic tourism products that have been rectified offline for many years still plagued by chaos online?
A Beijing tourism blogger revealed that traditional customer acquisition channels are through storefronts or peers. In the storefront, customers can understand the general quality of the group. However, in the live broadcast room, many times the host is not familiar with this product. Although it is a "cost-effective product", it is packaged as a "quality product". It costs 20000 yuan to travel in Europe for a week, but tourists are allowed to stay in remote hotels. It's strange that tourists don't complain about it. Many tourism products are aimed at guiding people to make money in the "gray area" of shopping, but these are not reflected in the live broadcast room. Product details and anchor introductions are all positive aspects, and the true situation of the products is not fully reflected. Some local media outlets admit that overcharging users attracted by the platform is due to poor information.
How can tourists who choose to travel abroad with group tours avoid pitfalls and avoid pitfalls?
Zhang Jing said that from the perspective of regulatory authorities, in order to protect the legitimate rights and interests of tourists, on the one hand, by establishing and improving overseas tourism information platforms, we can strengthen education on tourist safety information, exit channels, overseas assistance, and self-protection awareness; On the other hand, it is necessary to strengthen the supervision and guidance of overseas tourism service institutions, urge enterprises to regularly inspect their overseas travel products and overseas partners, promptly remove unqualified products, and terminate cooperation with incompetent overseas partners in a timely manner.
"The government can start from several aspects to regulate overseas tourism: strengthening the supervision of domestic travel agencies engaged in overseas tourism services, as travel agencies have an obligation to arrange overseas services that comply with laws, regulations, and contract agreements; actively cooperating with the cultural and tourism departments and the diplomatic departments to jointly safeguard the personal and property safety of Chinese overseas tourists; and further strengthening international cooperation in overseas tourism supervision," said Zhang Jing.
Dong Yuanyuan believes that practitioners in the tourism industry should further strengthen their compliance construction and operate in compliance with the law and integrity. The relevant industry organizations in the tourism industry should also further play a positive role in industry self-discipline, promoting the transparency and standardization of tourism products.
Ma Lihong, Senior Partner of Beijing Dehe Heng Law Firm and Deputy Director of the Culture and Tourism Professional Committee of the Beijing Lawyers Association, said that the issues involved in overseas travel are quite complex, such as being forced to shop overseas or purchasing goods with quality defects, or suffering personal injury. If there is no clear contract clause with domestic travel agencies that stipulates that travel agencies should bear corresponding responsibilities, it is often difficult to trace back to domestic travel agencies. Therefore, in order to better protect their rights, tourists participating in group tours should choose regular travel agencies, obtain invoices, itineraries, and sign contracts to prove their transaction relationship and service agreements with travel agencies. Some tourists who participate in tourist groups without obtaining the above certificates often cannot effectively protect their rights due to the inability to determine the responsible party.
"Chinese tourists traveling abroad should follow the consular reminders issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Chinese embassies and consulates abroad through the China Consular Service Network and the 'Consular Direct' new media platform, understand the basic situation and security situation of the destination, and avoid traveling to countries and regions with high security risks. At the same time, they should have advance access to the consular protection and assistance hotline of the Chinese embassy and consulate in the local area, as well as the contact information of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' global consular protection and service emergency hotline. If necessary, they should call for assistance in a timely manner." Ma Lihong reminded.
