AN ABTA-endorsed newsletter is being sent to every UK travel agent to try to bolster tourism to the Dominican Republic.
The Airtours newsletter claims that health and accommodation problems associated with the Caribbean island have now been eradicated.
“By the end of summer ’98, the Dominican Republic was our second highest scoring destination in terms of customer satisfaction,” said Airtours senior marketing manager long-haul Vicky Wilby.
“A year before that it was number eight. We need to get the message to the trade about how much it has improved.”
Wilby said Airtours now employed someone in the Dominican Republic to focus entirely on health-and-safety issues in the island’s hotels and to work closely with monitoring company Cristal.
Airtours has dropped from its programme four 2A-rated hotels which it felt were not up to the required standard. Capacity to the Dominican Republic has been cut back from 30,000 to around 17,000 for 1999 but Wilby is confident that demand can return to peak levels within two years.
“The Dominican Republic is still the cheapest option in the Caribbean and it also compares favourably with the Canaries for offering good value for money,” she said.