A recent (not sure how recent as no date available with the article) check by Global Blue, the Tax Free company, with tour operators in Japan and China brought up the interesting but not entirely unsurprising finding that people are not too interested to come visit the UK in the period leading up to, and during the Olympic Games. The tour operators spoken to cite the fear of unreasonable flight and hotel costs and further restrictions on the visa application process as reasons to avoid Britain this summer.
In China, this is obviously directly linked to their experience in 2008 when both of these factors contributed to a drop in tourism over all into the country. Visas were heavily restricted due to security concerns, and hotels put up their prices sky high.
It it too much to hope that the UK government is paying attention and will come out with a charm offensive to assure would be travellers that hotels and airlines will be reasonable with their pricing and applying for a visa would not be any more difficult than the (admittedly already pretty tough) current visa process? Is there any cash left in the coffers to spend on a charm offensive?
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