The triangular debt chain is broken, tourists are abandoned, and the travel agency is behind the group.

Xinguiwang-South China Morning Post reporter Qin Guiyuan Zhao Yongsheng

[Because the group money is not available, the travel agency "dumped" the tourists; Because a certain purpose can’t be achieved, the travel agency takes the tourists as "hostages" … All along, the tourism management department has repeatedly forbidden the travel agency to leave and detain the group, but in this year’s Spring Festival Golden Week, the incident of leaving and detaining the group caused by taking the guests as "hostages" has occurred from time to time, and tourists have suffered a lot. Why is there a phenomenon of throwing a group and detaining a group? Our reporter visited this]

[Phenomena] Throw-off and buckle-off occur frequently.

Recalling the family’s "Beijing-Harbin" trip, Mr. Yin of Nanning is still angry.

This year, Mr. Yin’s family gathered in Nanning for the New Year’s Day and spent tens of thousands of yuan in tour fees. On the second day of the New Year’s Day, a family of 13 people, old and young, happily embarked on a "Beijing-Harbin" tour organized by a travel agency in Nanning.

After flying to Beijing, the family constantly tasted the taste of being dumped: because the money was not in place, the Beijing Land Agency had to "hang people" several times, ignoring the love of eating, living and playing, paying the deposit for accommodation and buying tickets by itself. After some tossing, the tour group finally bumped into Harbin.

After arriving in the northeast, everyone was "lost" outside the hotel because of the "money has not arrived" of Beijing Travel Agency.

On February 14th, the time for the return trip is coming, and the money still hasn’t arrived. As a result, the travel agencies in the northeast have come up with a "trick"-"jilt"! Regardless of food, accommodation and return tickets for tourists. Everyone tried their best, but finally they missed the plane from Beijing to Nanning. It was not until Beijing and Northeast travel agencies left the group that the National Tourism Administration was alarmed. With the intervention of the National Tourism Administration, a group of talents returned to Nanning "rolling and crawling".

Coincidentally. On February 15 this year, a group of more than 20 people from Guangxi traveled to the Sino-Vietnamese border. At Mangjie Port in Vietnam, the Vietnamese border inspection staff indicated that they were not allowed to leave the border. Everyone looked at each other and inquired, only to find out that a travel agency in Guangxi and a travel agency in Vietnam had to deduct money from the group because the group money was "unclear". Finally, after the coordination of the tourism departments of both sides, the tourists were able to return to Dongxing at 20: 40 that night, but everyone’s original good mood was also "deducted".

In recent years, reporters have encountered or interviewed many examples of desertion and detention.

[Consequences] Tourists and travel agencies "both lose"

Tourism is a kind of physical and mental pleasure, but for various reasons, innocent tourists are taken as hostages and dumped and detained all the way. In this "competition", tourists are the ones who suffer the most.

During the Spring Festival this year, a tour group from Guangxi traveled to the northeast. Due to the repeated desertions from travel agencies in Beijing and Northeast China, tourists were tortured: they were hungry and cold along the way, and their itinerary was "shrunk"; Everyone spent thousands of dollars each, wasting time and "buying back" their anger. Mr. Yin, who participated in this trip, told the reporter: Abandoning the tour group is one of the worst behaviors of the travel agency, and I will never dare to participate in such a "trip" again.

Although it is a travel agency that abandons and detains the group, it is not a "winner" in this "game".

The boss of a travel agency said that if the other party leaves the group, the travel agency that organized the group will definitely not want to make money. Travel agencies, travel agencies and tourists also lost the minimum trust, and finally travel agencies had to accept the punishment of the management department. "In short, leaving the group is one of the last things that travel agencies want to see."

[Probe into the Causes] Dumping and detaining the group are all due to "money"

It stands to reason that tourists pay the tour fare, and the group travel agency and the ground travel agency can make reasonable profits as long as they provide services according to the contract. Why do some travel agencies fail to transfer money on time, causing the other travel agency to abandon the group? On this puzzling question, the reporter visited some people in the tourism industry and learned that both dumping and detaining the group are for the word "money". Among them, the two most prominent reasons are the difficult triangular debt relationship and the lack of honesty between travel agencies.

According to the manager of a travel agency in Nanning, when a travel agency travels in a group, if it involves scenic spots in several provinces or regions, it must be received by the local land agency, which means that the tour group formed by the group agency must be received by multiple land agencies during the tour. In order to save costs, the package tour agency usually only contacts one land agency and pays all the package money to it, and then this land agency is responsible for contacting and paying the package money to the land agencies of other scenic spots. In this way, as long as one of the "chains" breaks, the whole trip may be problematic immediately.

It is understood that when Mr. Yin’s family travels to Beijing and Harbin, it is reasonable that the tour group agency in Nanning should hand over all the tour money to the land agency in Beijing, and then the land agency in Beijing will contact the land agency in Harbin and be responsible for transferring the tour money to the land agency in Harbin.

However, the tour group in Nanning defaulted on the tour payment of Beijing Land Agency, knocking down the first "domino", which caused Beijing to default on Harbin again, forming a triangular debt that was difficult to untie for a while. During this year’s Spring Festival Golden Week, some other "ice and snow trips" were not spared, and similar triangular debts appeared.

In tourism management, some tour groups are afraid that the other travel agency has not provided corresponding services and want to use the tour money to contain each other; If the other party can’t get the money, they will dump and deduct the group in anger. As a result, "I won’t give money even more if you don’t provide services", resulting in a vicious circle.

The manager of a travel agency in Nanning said frankly that because it is often the first time to do business with the other travel agency, he is always afraid that the other party will do something badly and cause complaints from the guests, and the group agency will have to pay compensation. Therefore, under normal circumstances, the two parties will stipulate in the contract that 70% of the group money will be paid first, and the remaining 30% will be paid after the trip is over. If the other party stresses honesty, this is the best way to cooperate, but sometimes the other party’s strength is too weak. During the Golden Week peak period when everything has to be paid in cash, the land agency that can’t bear it finally simply leaves the group.

There are also some tour groups that contact with the other party’s land agency. Although the contract says that the tour money should be paid in full before the end of the tour, the tour groups take the form of default, which leads to the other party being unconvinced and abandoning or detaining the tour. Sometimes, in order to successfully "collect debts", the land agency takes passengers as "hostages" and detains them locally.

[Countermeasures] Can you use the quality guarantee money to deal with the group desertion?

Leaving and detaining tour groups not only harms the interests of tourists, but also seriously disrupts the tourism order and worsens the tourism environment. How to find the crux of the problem and put an end to this phenomenon? A person in the tourism industry analyzed that the punishment and compensation for the travel agency’s abandonment and detention of the group is too low, which makes the travel agency "fearless". Compared with travel agencies, tourists are completely in a weak position.

For example, according to the relevant compensation regulations, because of the travel agency, the travel agency only compensates for the scenic spots that tourists have not visited, which are only twice as much as the tickets; If these scenic spots don’t need tickets, the amount will have to be pressed down when making compensation. "We mainly go to play, and we don’t want this tens of dollars in compensation. It took thousands of dollars to see the scenic spots, and it is difficult to come back in the future. Is this loss only worth tens of dollars? " A tourist said.

The staff of the tourism quality supervision department of the autonomous region said frankly that at present, there are no specific regulations on tourism compensation, which are generally implemented with reference to the compensation provisions in the Consumer Protection Law. The compensation received by tourists is really not high. In the contest with travel agencies, tourists are in an unfair position. "But the tourism quality supervision department only plays a coordinating role, and there is no right to punish. If tourists are dissatisfied with coordination, they can also solve it through legal channels." However, he also made it clear that if it is verified that it is the responsibility of the travel agency, the Tourism Bureau will not tolerate it and will punish it. In serious cases, it will even suspend business for rectification and revoke its business license.

Some tourists call for the introduction of regulations on travel compensation as soon as possible, and the bad behavior of abandoning and detaining the group should be severely punished until it is "painful", instead of lightly punishing twice the ticket price. The relevant person in charge of the Tourism Quality Supervision Department of the Tourism Bureau of the Autonomous Region also hopes that laws and regulations that implement the principle of heavy punishment can be introduced, so that the Tourism Bureau can have evidence to follow when handling it.

An expert called on the National Tourism Administration to allow local tourism bureaus to use the quality guarantee money of travel agencies at critical moments. "For example, if the tourism bureau can use the quality guarantee money of travel agencies in Harbin, everything can be dealt with immediately. Where will tourists suffer without food or shelter?" Some insiders believe that only by establishing the integrity between travel agencies can we solve the problem of arrears, and then avoid the phenomenon of leaving and detaining the group. Therefore, travel agencies must abide by the "rules of the game". For tourists, it is necessary to choose a powerful travel agency to reduce the chances of abandoning and detaining the group.