HCMC – Local tour guides can use their paper-based practicing cards until September 30, instead of on Thursday, following a new decision by the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT).
VNAT earlier asked the provincial departments of culture, sports and tourism to complete the issuance of the new plastic cards by September 1, but this job cannot be completed due to strict requirements provided by the Tourism Law.
The law forces tour guides to have a bachelor degree but many experienced guides for markets such as Germany, Italy, Japan, China, Russia and South Korea find it impossible to meet this requirement, meaning they cannot change their cards.
This explains why only 283 of 1,680 professional card holders serving foreign tourists in HCMC as the country’s tourist hub have had their cards replaced so far.
The new rule has put many tourism companies at stake, such as those serving Chinese-speaking tourists. The city has only 184 tour guides responsible for tourists from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore and Taiwan but visitor arrivals from these markets are on the steady increase.
Last year, Chinese-speaking visitors to HCMC accounted for 21.6%, or more than 500,000, of the total number of international arrivals. For that reason, many companies will certainly fall short of tour guides if these people fail to change their cards.
“Just about half of the tour guides can change their cards but the proportion of eligible Chinese-speaking guides is even lower because many of them do not have a bachelor degree,” said Nguyen Duc Chi, deputy head of the Travel Division of the city’s Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism.
He said VNAT’s latest decision to the extend the deadline for card change would help resolve the problem for French-speaking guides because they had 10 years’ experiences and a high-school diploma on French before 1975 as required.
“To me, the requirements should be flexible depending on experiences and skills rather than an academic degree. But the law has no mention of work experience,” Chi said.
Chi said the department was not sure whether it could get the card changing job done by the end of this month.
For tour guides for domestic visitors who now have certificates issued by their travel companies, they will also have to register for the new cards with the administration.
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