The travel industry is buzzing with activity as the world moves beyond the pandemic with renewed confidence following aggressive vaccination drives. In India, the festive holiday season is seeing tourists throng popular, as well as offbeat, destinations with vigour. The return of travellers now reaffirms the potential of travel and hospitality sector in the new normal.
The earliest bunch of travellers were predominantly people returning home or those visiting families after a long gap. However, now people are looking to unwind, explore and break the monotony of having been confined to their homes.
The resurgence of travel being witnessed in the US, Europe, and Asia will only gain momentum with each month. Health experts in India are now of the opinion that the country has mostly succeeded in avoiding a third wave.
In the early stages of the resumption, we are likely to see rise in travel between countries that have manageable or low pandemic caseloads and good access to vaccination. Many EU nations and the US have vaccinated a significant number of people. India is inching close to administering 1 billion doses of the vaccine, and this will lead to strong recovery in these regions.
Even without the international travel returning to full-scale, the tourism sector in most countries is already witnessing great business courtesy of the domestic tourists. USA, India, China and European countries are experiencing heavy footfall and with the festival season in full-swing, the numbers will only rise. Thus, it is time to prepare for the upcoming travel boom in 2022. There are four key areas that every travel and hospitality service provider must focus on in order to ensure a seamless, joyful and swift travel experience to the tourists.
ENHANCING CAPACITY
The pandemic brought about downsizing of capacity and human resources. A large number of part-time and contract workers were rendered jobless and hotels gave up their expansion plans.
Now, the travel sector is going to witness a rapid surge and rebuilding or expansion of capacity has to be a top priority. There is a major shortage of staff as a lot of workers who lost jobs last year might not work in the travel sector anymore.
This is why companies need to rapidly hire new people. The time now is ripe for the players to start retraining their personnel, mobilizing the infrastructure and preparing for a boom that is no more than a quarter or two away in most regions.
INVESTING IN CUSTOMER-CENTRIC INNOVATIONS
Loss of revenue might have made most travel companies cash-strapped, but this is where investments in digital technology is going to be crucial. Digitization of processes and the customer journey will help in overcoming staff shortage and also lead to greater customer comfort and confidence. Digital assistance and contact-less services, automated airport and hotel check-in etc., are going to be of utmost essence.
While the festive and upcoming winter season is bound to see travellers flock their favourite destinations, the summer of 2022 is likely to witness greater volumes. That’s why the industry needs to proactively digitize operations instead of waiting for the full-scale resumption to take place. For instance, manual check-in processes are time consuming and often a cause of irritation.
With lesser people to man the desks, wait times will get only longer. Hence, digitisation of the process is the best solution. Through IoT sensors, video surveillance and self-service computer/tablet terminals, airports, hotels and airports can effectively ensure hygiene and social distancing protocols in a faster and more convenient manner.
REVISION OF PROCESSES
Services and processes need to be redesigned to cater to the new normal. The traveller profile is going to change along with the preferences. Unlike the practice of booking months and even a year in advance, people would now seek flexible plane tickets closer to the date of departure with easy cancellation, refund or free changes. With business travel expected to take much longer to resume, meetings and conference rooms might require repurposing to suit the leisure travellers.
FOCUSING ON THE ECOSYSTEM
Building capacity, digitization and simplification will also have to be accompanied by learning from the ecosystem. Travel operators need to constantly watch trends and developments in various parts of the world and be ready with a fluidic approach based on analytics and insights.
The processes adopted by hospitality providers in US could be equally relevant to those in India and vice-versa. Collaboration between different service providers will lead to greater business generation and traveller comfort. Partnerships between airlines and hotels, hotels and taxi services or an integrated local ecosystem promoted by tourism boards and authorities are going to be the order of the day.
The travel industry and travellers have waited for a long time to get going once again. Hence, it is important that the upcoming boom is effectively catered to as it will pave the way for long-term and sustainable growth of the global tourism industry!
