The Travel Industry Council of Hong Kong (TIC) expresses its gratitude for the scheme to be launched by the Government to provide relief funding directly to travel agents.

The Government, together with the TIC and the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB), will launch a travel agent incentive scheme, under which travel agents will each be paid HK$120 for receiving an overnight inbound visitor or HK$100 for each outbound traveller who has joined an outbound package tour or bought a travel package, air tickets, etc, from late November this year until the end of March next year. Each travel agent may apply for funding for up to 500 inbound visitors and outbound travellers, which means HK$60,000 cash incentive at most for each travel agent.

Chairman of the TIC Jason Wong remarked, “The travel industry has been gravely affected by the protests, which have lasted for over four months. I believe the morale of traders will be boosted this time as the Government is going to dish out cash to directly help travel agents, which will be benefited.”

The scheme is financed by the Government, and the TIC will distribute funding when outbound travellers are involved while the HKTB will do the same when inbound visitors are involved.

Details such as the criteria and procedures for application will be announced later.