Travel enquiries, bookings pick up as the second wave of Covid-19 slows down

According to a report in The mint, as daily infection cases decline and restrictions start to ease across the country, consumers stuck at home are back to planning travel. Even though travel and hospitality firms have seen limited bookings for June, they are flooded with enquiries and expect better business in July and August. Travel operators said that they have witnessed upto 50% jump in enquiries in the last ten days.

Varying travel guidelines across states are also leading to increase in enquiries. Goa, for instance, requires either a negative RT-PCR certificate or full covid vaccination certificate. To enter Himachal Pradesh, one needs a valid e-pass and a negative RT-PCR certificate. Uttarakhand, on the other hand, is conducting on-arrival covid test for passengers arriving from certain states with high number of covid cases like Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka among others.

SOTC said that there has been a 35-40% increase in week-on-week enquiries. “Customers are looking for guidance and handholding more than ever before. Our teams are working closely to support customers with our flexibility in rebooking/changes and free cancellation,” said Daniel D’souza, president & country head, Leisure, SOTC Travel.

Thomas Cook India said visitor traffic on its website in June is already up by 33% over May and lead demand for holidays has seen a healthy jump of over 30% in the last week.

“Top searches and queries are for domestic favourites like Ladakh and Kashmir. Millennials, young working professionals and ad hoc groups of family/ friends are the segments driving demand currently. In addition to metros, mini metros and tier II source markets like Jaipur, Chandigarh, Lucknow are also fuelling travel demand,” said Rajeev Kale, president & country Head – Holidays, MICE, Visa, Thomas Cook (India) Ltd.

MakeMyTrip said that booking patterns indicate that confidence is building back in travel with cancellations being limited to only 10% of overall bookings being made on the platform for the month of June. This is equivalent to the number of cancellations that were made in February this year.