Home Office cuts red tape for Chinese visitors
The UK Government has unveiled the latest phase of measures designed to woo more Chinese visitors to Britain.
A new 24-hour visa service will be launched in August and from the autumn Chinese visitors will be able to use an Irish visitor visa to travel to the UK, without the need for a separate UK visa, and vice versa.
The British Irish Visa Scheme will also be launched in India.
The Home Office said a pilot programme launched last year for tour operators, allowing them to work from a single form in processing UK and Schengen visa applications, massively speeded up the process.
The scheme will now be extended to all Chinese visitors applying to come to the UK.
Talks are also ongoing with European partners about further streamlining visa processes with Schengen arrangements to make trips to the UK even easier for Chinese visitors.
Alongside this, a more user-friendly form for independent travellers will be launched on the Home Office’s new more integrated website.
It will feature better guidance on visa categories and how to apply and has been designed for full integration on mobile and tablet platforms.
The Government has recently introduced other measures to boost Chinese visitors numbers, including 12 dedicated visa application centres across China and a new dedicated team in the British Embassy in Beijing.
Patricia Yates, director of strategy and communications at VisitBritain, said: "Recent streamlining of the visa processing has made a big difference, with Chinese visitor spending up a record 64% to nearly half a billion pounds."
According to VisitBritain:
– There were 196,000 visits from China to Britain last year, an increase of 9.7% on 2012.
– The Chinese average spend per visit in 2013 was £2,508, compared to a total average spend per visit across all markets of £640.
– London accounts for 58% of all visits from China. Other popular destinations include Manchester, Edinburgh, Oxford, Glasgow and Cambridge.
– Two-fifths of holiday visits to Britain are part of multi-country tours.
– Their favourite activities are museums, castles, football matches, gardens, love of high end British products
– The key motivators are ‘enjoy the beauty of the landscape’, ‘feel connected to nature’ and ‘have fun and laughter’.
– The Chinese are more likely to perceive the UK as being ‘romantic’ – 24% of Chinese, compared to 18% of all respondents – and ‘spiritual’ – 21% of Chinese compared to 7%.
– Britain is highly associated with museums, but the Chinese do not associate Britain with sport.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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