Vietnamese tend to travel abroad on May holiday

Outbound tours with the departure time in late April or early May have been nearly fully booked. Going abroad is the choice of many Vietnamese people who want to save money in the context of high inflation.
A good business season for travel firms
Travel firms have reported that the number of travelers booking tours for May holiday still has increased by 20-30 percent in comparison with the same period of the last year. Though Vietnamese people have to tighten their belt in the economic difficulties, they still have been attracted by impressive sale promotion campaigns launched by travel firms.
Newstartour has launched a special program on the occasion of its 10th anniversary of establishment. Luong Duy Doanh, Deputy Director of Ngoi Sao Moi, said that the travelers booking tours to Nan Ning (China) would enjoy the discount of 600,000 dong, i.e. every traveler would pay 2,668,000 dong instead of 3,260,000 dong. Besides, the travelers would have the chance to join many activities to be organized by the firm on the occasion.
Vietravel has launched “Your attractive April tours” program, under which travelers would enjoy the sharp discount of 2 million dong when booking domestic tours Hanoi – Yen Tu Temple – Ha Long Pay – Sa Pa – Do Temple, or Hanoi – Yen Tu Temple – Ha Long bay – Tuan Chau island – Bai Dinh Temple – Trang An.
Vietrantour has introduced a cluster of domestic tours with hundreds of tourism products. Those travelers who book tours prior to April 13 would receive 200,000 dong from the travel firm right when they make deposit for the tours.
Going abroad to save money
Travel firms have reported that Vietnamese travelers tend to choose outbound tours for holidays, simply because the fees of the tours to neighboring countries are lower than domestic tours.
Le Thi Thanh Thao, an office worker, said that domestic tours are more expensive than the tours to regional countries. Therefore, Thao has decided to book an outbound tour this May holiday, saying that she needs to cut down spending in the context of high inflation.
Binh An, a tour operator of Dat Viet travel firm, also said that the number of travelers booking outbound tours has increased more sharply than the number of travelers choosing domestic tours.
The tours to Thailand, Cambodia and China have been favored by Vietnamese people, who believe that the tour fees are reasonable, while the service quality is better than domestic tours.
Le Duc Minh from Ratraco in Hanoi has also affirmed that most of the clients of the firm have chosen outbound tours. To date, the number of bookings has been double that of the same period of the last year.
Minh said 70 percent of travelers decided to go abroad because domestic tours are a little more expensive than outbound tours. For example, a tour from Hanoi to the sea city of Nha Trang which lasts five days and four nights costs 9 million dong. Meanwhile, a tour from Hanoi to Thailand, also for the five days and four nights costs 8.2 million dong only.
Explaining this, Minh said that domestic tour fees have increased because of the higher input costs, including the transport fee, service fees at the destination points and hotel room rates.
He went on to say that going abroad has become a growing tendency in the last two years. The travelers booking domestic tours just account for 1/3 of the total travelers on holidays. They believe that outbound tours have more attractive destinations, better services, more diversified activities, and especially, have reasonable fees.