A new survey from the Association of Canadian Travel Agencies (ACTA) revealed that 58.7 per cent of Canadians surveyed support continued wage, rent and other subsidies for travel agent businesses.
The survey was conducted by Mainstreet Research on behalf of ACTA and involved interviewing 1291 adults over the phone between 12 to 14JUN.
ACTA notes that the 58.7 per cent of Canadians spans all demographics and voters across the political spectrum, as well as undecided voters.
Further findings are also encouraging.
40 per cent of consumer respondents re-booked travel that was canceled because of the pandemic. 61 per cent say they plan to travel once restrictions are lifted. And 1 in 5 say that they plan to travel more often once the pandemic is over.
“We are encouraged that there is hope for a significant rebound of travel once the pandemic concerns are behind us,” said Wendy Paradis, president of ACTA. ”Travel agents are already seeing an uptick in bookings for this winter and next year and this survey certainly supports increased demand coming soon.”
ACTA adds their real goal in conducting the survey is to be able to present its results to Canada’s elected officials, reminding them of the gravity of the industry’s situation and the need to extend government programs for the travel trade.
Paradis added, “Travel restrictions and advisories remain, and travel agent businesses will need continued federal support at full levels and for 90 days after restrictions and advisories are lifted to survive continued months of little to no revenue.”
Things are improving and bookings for 2022 and 2023 are picking up but we will not receive any revenue to the office until full payment is made or the clients have travelled, depending on the supplier. Travel was the first hit and will be the last to recover and with the boarders closed the government has closed our business. The CRB and Rent Subsidy MUST continue for our industry to insure travel agencies can survive. I have kept all my employees on with this help, job sharing and putting personal assets and my personal CRB into my business but they are running out. In a few months we will be desperate and looking at bankruptcy. We can’t open up and generate revenue when lock down orders are lifted because the government has closed our markets and ability to recover.