Major poll says holidays not affordable
More than half of Australians surveyed say they can’t afford a holiday, even before next week’s expected interest rate rise further bites into their budgets, a major poll on the issue has revealed.
Financial pressure far outweighs issues such being too busy, fears about job security or not being allowed to take time-off for why Australians are not taking their holiday leave.
The survey, conducted by Australia’s leading holiday destination website totaltravel.com over the last four weeks and involving more than 4000 respondents, asked: According to research, Australians aren’t taking their annual holiday leave. Why aren’t you taking yours?
Almost six out of every ten of those surveyed (2384 or 59 per cent) said that couldn’t afford to take their holiday leave.
Of the rest, 19 per cent (796) said they were too busy to take time off; 10 per cent (433) were afraid their job wouldn’t be there when they returned; and 5 per cent (227) said their boss wouldn’t let them take time off. The remaining 6 per cent (252) sited other reasons.
Paul Fisher, spokesman for totaltravel.com – ranked the number one site for Australians seeking information about destinations – said the survey result was of great concern to the tourism sector especially with another interest rate rise tipped for next week.
“We knew that Australians weren’t taking their holiday leave but it wasn’t clear why until now,” Mr Fisher said.
“No matter how clever the ad campaigns are, if Australians feel they can’t afford to go on holidays you are not going to get them to take leave.
“If there is a rate rise next week, Australian tourism operators are going to be asking themselves ‘where the bloody hell have all the tourists gone?’ for sometime yet.”
Totaltravel.com currently has up to 55,000 visitors a day and is now bigger than Lonely Planet, AAA Tourism and all the State Tourism Authority sites such as Tourism Qld for Australians seeking information about destinations.
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