Tour operators: the fall of the ruble led to the suspension of sales
The fall in the ruble exchange rate, which occurred at the beginning of this week, had a bad effect on the outbound direction. According to representatives of some travel agencies, the sale of foreign tours in a number of directions stopped.
The forecasts are disappointing: if the position of the national currency cannot change for the better, the demand for tour packages in the summer will drop by about 40%.
The United States recently introduced new sanctions against large entrepreneurs and companies in Russia, because of this, the Russian ruble exchange rate fell rapidly: on April 10, the Central Bank for the first time since December 2016 lowered the official ruble exchange rate against the US dollar on April 11 by 6.4% - from 58.57 rubles to 62.37 rubles, and even more to the euro by 6.9% (from 71.88 rubles to 76.85 rubles). Since the beginning of 2018, the ruble has fallen against the dollar by 9.33%, against the euro by 12.67%.
Irina Tyurina, a spokeswoman for the Russian Union of Travel Industry (PCT), said that tour operators do not record the immediate impact of the fall in the national currency on sales, but in the future players can expect a deterioration in demand. Directions within Russia in light of the current events may be in the positive. The depreciation of the Russian currency by one ruble gives an average of 100,000 additional tourists to the domestic market. Irina Tyurina notes that psychologically significant for Russian tourists is the mark of 60 rubles. for one dollar - sales may decline even more.
Some representatives of the tourism industry see a drop in demand for abroad already now. Tatiana Wand, CEO of the tour operator “Vand” believes that if in the coming days “the ruble will play back, then sales will gradually begin, if it will stand for 2-3 weeks at today’s mark, then sales will be very serious.”
General Director of the network of travel agencies “Pink Elephant” Alexander Mkrtchyan reports a decline in sales by 10-15%. He also notes that tourists who took care of the purchase of vouchers in advance, significantly saved on early booking.
Sergey Romashkin, CEO of the tour operator “Dolphin” notes the fact that for travelers who want to go on tour in Russia, nothing has changed. We see that such barrage rates stimulate trips to Russia, since ruble prices do not change in any way. Now tourists are watching the courses and assessing their financial risks, which of course have increased now, and this is in the hands of domestic tourism.