News by Phuket Andaman Villas

Deadly event in Bangkok was believed affect in an explosion hitting hotels and other tourism industry throughout the country. However so far hoteliers in Phuket still believe that at the moment the situation in the capital is still an isolated epicenter, both by figures and by opinion.

President of Centara, a leading Thai hotel chain, Kevin Wallace said “outside Bangkok we are doing very well, 100% in Phuket, Krabi, Pattaya and Hua Hin, even overbooked in Koh Samui, no cancellations at all”.

The General Manager of the Holiday Inn at Patong, Wolfgang Meusberger, is taking a longer span by saying “we are seeing that cancellation is slightly higher than normal pattern, about 20% for the coming week, and we are foreseeing even more as working day will be started after the weekend”. “Next week may go up as people are leaving Bangkok for Songkran, but in longer term we are seeing reduced trend for April, May and June”, he continued. “Customers asked about safety in Phuket, and there are many cancellations by those with joint package of Bangkok and Phuket”. “The longer the turmoil the more cancellation to come”, he finally concluded.

In contrast, Pieter van der Hoeven, Corporate Director of Sales and Marketing Asia for Outrigger Laguna Phuket Resort and Villas shortly commented “no cancellations at all.” However he confirmed that the booking was slowing down which he thought normal as May is normally the weakest month of the year.

General Manager Andara Resort Villas at Kamala, Andrew Whitaker said “travel advisories do not clearly mention that Bangkok is the only affected area and we are seeing cancellations especially from Hong Kong and Taiwan”.

In 2009 Phuket had a rebound in tourism industry when number of arrivals soared back to the same figures of 2007, prior to the global economic crisis. One of the most significant contributing factor was increasing flight availability as routes canceled after tsunami were restored and many new routes were added.

Sustaining political unrest may cause direct flights canceled or reduced, especially from main feeder markets like Hong Kong and Singapore, and in turn sets back the cycle of Phuket tourism development. The likeliness is quite serious as political tension in Bangkok tends to escalate and widen up to other areas in Thailand.