Nguyen Thi Khanh, vice chairwoman of the association, said that the Tourism Association of the Mekong Delta, travel firms and hotels in 12 provinces and cities have promised to reduce the service fees by around 30%. Furthermore, Thua Thien-Hue and Nghe An provinces have also agreed to participate
the program, she said.

Given the active participation, the package price of domestic tours earlier noticed by the HCMC Tourism Association and Vietnam Airlines can be marked down by over 30%.

Binh Thuan Province and Danang City will also join in this program though they have not provided the list of hotels agreeing to lower fees and the specific discount rate yet.

“We are pretty optimistic according to the enthusiastic response of these provinces and have begun to talk partners in the northern area into participating the program. The larger cooperation among localities will bring more benefits to tourists, not only a discount of 30% as expected firstly,” Khanh told the Daily on Thursday.

The travel promotes program 2012 organized by the HCMC Tourism Association and Vietnam Airlines will last until this year-end.

According to the program, the national air carrier will offer a discount of 40% on fares on some routes so that nearly 20 member travel firms having the highest number of domestic tourists can offer discounted package tours to attract more tourists.

In addition to the airfare reduction, travel firms will lower the service fees to supply clients with a low package price which was planned 30% lower than the normal rate at first.

There have been 9,000 air tickets booked since travel firms noticed discounted air tickets on April 20. More tickets will be purchased in the summer travel season, according to Khanh.

“Vietnam Airlines says that there are still lots of tickets for the travel season. We desire to sell more tours when getting the cooperation of localities to offer a lower price,” she said.

When the tourism reduced in 2009, Vietnam used to launch a similar program on a national scale which brought strong growth for the domestic tourism.

Source: VietNamNet/Viet Nam News

Vietnam guide, Vietnam travel guide