Paper Sample on Visits to UK and Rest of World: Drivers of Travel Industry Growth

Introduction

A high number of overseas residents visit the UK and equally a high number of UK residents visits the rest of the world. Such visits require huge expenditure from which the country earn large sums of money. The travel industry has become dynamic triggering innovation, adaptation and the need for newer destinations, flights and travel companies (Travel Trends, 2018). Imperatively, the industry is driven by various customer needs and holiday habits. The high number of visits despite the challenging economy could be associated with the beautiful sceneries, magical treats and fantastic nightlife in the UK and the overseas areas of visits (Travel Trends, 2018). The purpose of this report was to provide an analysis of the TravelPac Q3 2017 data to gain an understanding of the pattern of travel by overseas residents. From the analysis, the report intended to highlight interesting findings and make a recommendation about the potential target segment that travel agents can focus on as it intends to serve overseas residents wishing to travel to Britain.

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Background Information

The UK economy has been faced with a challenging economy as a result of inflation, assault on the value of the pound and outstripping wage growth. However, even with the challenging economy, the demand for the visits especially for the holiday purposes has remained strong. According to the Travel Trend 2017, the number of people visiting overseas by UK residents has been on the rise (Office of National Statistics, 2017). Since 2012 the number of visits has been increasing. In 2017, the visits were 72.8 million which represents a 3% increase in comparison to the 2016 visits. On the other hand, the number of overseas residents visiting the UK was 39.2 million which represented a 4% increase in comparison to the 2016 visits (Office of National Statistics, 2017). The number of visits recorded in 2017 was the highest recorded since the increase started in 2010. The upward general trend on the number of visits to the UK has been noticed since 2010. However, the number of visits has been experienced since the survey started since in 1997 the number of visits was 25.5 million visits. The expenditure on UK visits amounted to PS44.8 billion in 2017 (Office of National Statistics, 2017). This figure represented a 2% rise from 2016 and depicted a correlation with the 3% increase in the number of visits. On the other hand, the expenditure by the overseas residents visiting the UK in 2017 amounted to PS24.5 billion (Barton, 2018). Compared to the number of visits which was 3%, the figure was larger. Hence, the spending by both the UK residents and the overseas residents has been on the rise since 1997 (Office of National Statistics, 2017). The Holiday Habits Report (2018) shows that most of the visitors, spend less money when they are oversees compared to when they are within the UK. The report shows a fall in the average amount of money spent on holidays. The statistics show that spend is down for the longer UK breaks from PS311 to PS271 which represent a fall by PS40. On the other hand, the longer holidays abroad had an average fall in spend from PS586 to PS562. The statistics depict more careful budgeting for the oversee visits compared to domestic visits. Moreover, people are more inclined towards spending less rather than go for a holiday.

Among the various purposes of visits, the holiday remains the most common reason for visiting the UK. Holidays amounted to 15.4 million visits to the UK and accounted for 39% of the entire number of visits. For other purposes of visits, miscellaneous and friends and family amounted to 3.1 million and 12.0 million and represented an increase. However, the number of business visits decreased from 9.2 million to 8.8 million in 2016 and 2017 respectively translating to 4% fall (Office of National Statistics, 2017).

According to the Holiday Habits Report (2018), the number of people going on holidays is on the rise with huge expenditures. The report posits that even with unprecedented political turbulence and uncertainty, a large number of people is still committed to having their holiday from their homes.

Analysis

Data collection was done through the International Passenger Survey (IPS) which collects data on the travels and tourism visits to the UK and from the UK to overseas as well as their associated earnings and expenditure. A simplified version of the IPS databases namely Travelpac was used and contained 14 most widely used categorical and continuous variables. The survey is often conducted by the Office of the National statistics to show the travel trends every year every quarter. The survey collects data on overseas residents visiting the UK, UK residents visiting the UK and associated expenditure and earnings. Data collected was based on four continuous variables namely, visits, nights, spend and sample while the categorical variables were the year, quarter, Ukos, mode, purpose of visit, package, sex, age, duration, and country.

The analysis for the data collected from Travelpac, a simplified database of IPS was analyzed using the Excel Spreadsheet. Using the Excel application, various standard statistics such as mean, standards, mode, range, and t-test were performed. Besides, various tables and charts were drawn to present data in an easy to understand format.

The mean for the visits, and nights was 3919.998 and 41801.56 respectively. The median values for the two were found to be 1651.376 and 14566.13 respectively.

Frequency distribution of the respondents' age

The analysis results show the visits based on age brackets. The data was organized into nine age-based classes and their frequency determined. It was revealed that the youthful population contributed highly to the tourism industry for forming the highest frequency as visitors. The results show that visitors aged from 15 to 34, 35-44 and 45-54 had a frequency of 1716, 1726 and 1719 respectively. Two groups 16 to 24 and 55-64 followed closely with 1234 and 1296 respectively. The most vibrant age group in the visitors' population is the one between the ages of 35 to 44. Based on these results, most visitors are between the age of 25 to 64 below and above this age blanket are not frequent visitors. Cumulatively, the highest number of visitors was encountered by the people between the ages of 35-44.

Number of Visits, Nights and Spend

The table below shows the visits made by overseas residents, the nights they stayed and the spend they incurred. It shows that the mean visits equal to 3919.998 and the mean nights is equal to 41801.56 and the mean spend is equal to 2622176. Besides, the table below reveals that the median for the number of visits amounts to 1651.376, 14566.13 for the nights and 825688 for the expenditure.

Comparison of the Expenditure between Males and Females

From the analysis results, it was found that the mean for men was higher than the mean for the female counterparts. The value for male expenditures is more than double that for the expenditures by females. From this data, it can be deduced that men spend more than females during their overseas visits.

The table shows the various standard statistics for the visits made by females and males. The table shows the mean, variance, observations, pooled variance, one-tailed, and two-tailed statistics. From the table, the mean spent PS2642956.397, while females spent PS2598350 while abroad.

The observed difference in the above bar graph was assessed for statistical significance using a T-test analysis technique. The t-test results produced test statistic equal to t= 0.279335 with a probability value of 0.389997, greater than 0.05. The fact that the probability value was greater than the set level of significance made the researcher fail to reject the null hypothesis that males spent more than females abroad. Hence, a conclusion was made that both genders spent equal amounts when abroad. Hence, the stakeholders should target both genders since they both have the potential to contribute equally to the tourism sector. A planner would therefore not ignore any of the genders due to their anticipated potential.

Interesting Findings

The statistical analysis revealed two interesting findings. One was that despite males showing higher expenditures, than females, the females have high potential and can hence outdo the male in terms of expenditures. It is, therefore, not possible to conclude exhaustively that males spend more than females when they visit the UK from overseas. Secondly, it was interesting to find that out of the various groups classified based on age, the individuals between the ages of 35-44 were the ones who mostly visited regions in the UK. Below the most prevalent age group, the number of visits decreases such that the age groups below 15 years only accounted for 608 visits. However, as people advances in age, fewer people are likely to go for visits to the UK. As shown from the statistics, for 65 years and over, the number of visits were 886, D/K 30 and more than that was zero. This data shows that as people ages, they stop yearning for oversees leisure activities. It can be deduced that parents between the age of 35 and 44 are vibrant and have young children below the age of 15 years hence when they travel overseas, they go together with their children but not their aged parents.

Recommendations

The results show that despite the chart showing that males spend more than females, both genders spent equal amounts when they visit overseas. Besides, the population in the age of 35-44 years form the highest people going for the visits. Hence, the male aged between the ages of 35-44 form th...