Big hotel price hikes predicted for Beijing Games
BEIJING – Chinese tour operators have flagged that prices of holidays to the country are likely to quadruple next year as hoteliers, car hire companies and tour guides seek to cash in on the Olympic Games in Beijing.
Previous Olympics in Athens (2004) and Sydney (2000) were criticised for taking hotel prices to unprecedented levels, reports the UK’s Sunday Telegraph.
Yao Yuecan, president of the China International Travel Service – speaking at a forum on the Olympics in Qingdao in Shandong Province – said that these Games would be no different.
“The prices of hotel rooms, vehicles and tour guides in Beijing will all be at least four times higher than normal,” he said.
“Booking these services in advance will create a lot of risk for the travel agencies.”
Last summer, Xiang Paing, vice-director of the Games Services Department of the Beijing Organising Committee, said that room rates would be kept to “a sensible level” because the city has many hotels.
“As we promised in our Olympic bid,” he said, “the highest price for a standard room for accredited participants will be no higher than US$370.”
He announced that the organising committee had signed contracts with more than 100 hotels in the city.
However, these hotel rooms will mainly be taken up by the 50,000 accredited athletes, journalists, officials and sponsors, Xiang admitted that he could do nothing to prevent other hotels increasing prices.
Currently to book a double room at the five-star Crowne Plaza on August 8 – a year to the day from the opening ceremony – costs US$106. This is less than a third of the predicted average price for five-star accommodation.
Similarly, a double room at the four-star Shanshui Hotel costs US$64 on the same date, less than a quarter of the predicted Olympics price, while a double room at the three-star Home Inn-Guomao costs just US$30, a sixth of the average price next year.
The Beijing Tourism Administration estimates that during the Games the city will receive more than 500,000 foreign tourists.
However, Zou Feng, vice-president of the China International Travel Service, predicted that many travellers will deliberately avoid Beijing during the Games and may even wait until the following year, when prices will have returned to normal levels.
Ian Jarrett
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