Tiket.com Transactions have Tripled even though Pandemic

Online travel service provider startup (Online Travel Agent/OTA) Tiket.com recorded a threefold increase in transactions in the third quarter. The company is optimistic that this trend will continue until the end of the year, even though there is still a corona pandemic.

Tiket.com Chief Marketing Officer Gaery Undarsa said the tourism business in the first and second quarters was hit by Covid-19. The transaction also fell. Tiket.com initially predicted that new business would recover early next year.

However, the demand actually started to increase in the third quarter. “The growth is big. Three times that of the previous quarter,” said Gaery during a virtual press conference on Monday (2/11).

The biggest increase was accommodation services such as hotels. In addition, alternative accommodation services to support tourism needs such as glamor camping or glamping and villas are starting to increase orders.

“This is interesting because there is an element of privacy. Not meeting many people. This is very potential,” he said. Generally, those interested in this type of accommodation travel to places that are relatively close to their homes, such as Bogor. “During the coronavirus pandemic, going outside the city is not far away,” he said.

He noted that the city that attracted the most tourists during the long holiday at the end of October was Yogyakarta. Hotel reservations in this province were full. Gaery suspects that consumers are still worried about traveling long distances by plane, such as to Bali.

People choose tourist attractions that can be reached by land vehicles easily. The company prepared several strategies to attract more users. Primarily, changing the product from long-distance tourism to near home, by adding a wide selection of attractions and attractions nearby.

Company Launches Health and Hygiene Protocol Standardization Program

Tiket.com has also made a standardization program for health and hygiene protocols, ‘Tiket Clean’ so that users feel safe from the risk of contracting the coronavirus. This consists of checking employee and customer temperatures, the cleanliness of rooms and public facilities, and ensuring the availability of disinfectants in the hotel environment.

Partners who meet these standards will receive a visible label in the application. That way, consumers can find out which hotels have implemented this protocol. The company also provides Tiket Flexi, which allow users to book services even if they haven’t specified a date for going.

Apart from that, it provides free travel insurance for the users. “For example, every purchase of an airplane ticket includes free protection,” said Gaery. He is optimistic that the trend of increasing transactions will continue until the end of this year, because there are moments of long holidays and the emergence of new local tourist destinations.

“In the fourth quarter, I think it will be a turning point in the tourism industry,” he said. The company estimates that business will grow at least two times quarterly in the last three months. Meanwhile, the average hotel occupancy is estimated to increase by more than 70%.

Optimists Can Recover from Crisis

Previously, Tiket.com Chief Executive Officer George Hendrata also expressed optimism that the tourism industry will recover quickly. Because, he saw that the public was starting to take a vacation. This is reflected in the use of new features such as Tiket Clean and Flexi which have increased in the past three months.

“A quite positive response can be seen. The occupancy rate of some of our partners, especially hotels, has increased by 100% compared to the previous month,” said George, last August (13/8).

After more than 6 months of the Covid-19 outbreak, people are starting to dare to travel or to do staycations at hotels. This condition also made Tiket.com’s request for refund and reschedule decreased by 78 percent in the third quarter of 2020 from the second quarter of 2020.