The widespread use of Thai nominees by foreign businesses in Thailand is a growing concern among hoteliers, who fear that low prices and quality could destroy the tourism reputation of the country, according to the Thai Hotels Association's (THA) monthly sentiment index.
Thienprasit Chaiyapatranun, president of THA, said around half of the hotels in Thailand are worried about illegal foreign businesses and investment here, including Chinese entrepreneurs, according to the hotel operator business sentiment index for October.
Among four-star hotels and higher, 53% do not see these businesses as competitors because they have different target markets, but they still said these illegal businesses could affect the positive tourism image here, eventually triggering price wars in some destinations, said Mr Thienprasit.
"The government should put in more effort to crack down on those illegal businesses as they will impact the whole tourism industry," he said.
Three-star hotels and lower are more worried about prices as illegal hotels are direct competitors, and have the same concern about a bad image for the tourism industry in general, with hotels in the central and northern region having the most impact.
With the high season having started in October, the average occupancy rate of hotels nationwide stood at 57.6%, improving from 54% in the corresponding period last year, while 68% is expected for November.
By category, four-star hotels and above still had a stronger performance in October with 60.2% occupancy, while three-star hotels and below secured 52.7% occupancy, said Mr Thienprasit.
With a larger number of guests, hotels with more than four stars admitted that they faced labour shortage problems as they might be able to accommodate guests, but it still had an impact on quality of service with restricted numbers of staff.
Mr Thienprasit said hoteliers still need the government to provide training programmes to entice more workers into the hotel industry, particularly cleaners, waiters and waitresses, which were not sufficient in many hotels.
Meanwhile, he said hotel businesses would like the related authorities to maintain the stability of the Thai baht, keeping it at a steady rate compared to other countries with less fluctuation.
He said soft loans for those impacted by flooding should be approved more quickly to let them recover in time for the high season.
