Change take

Tour operators have realized that they cannot be satisfied with the safety of guests as a possible large-scale Covid outbreak will jeopardize their bottom line. So expect them to spend more resources protecting their customers during the rise of the Omicron variant.

Rashaad Jorden

Covid essentially brought large-scale tourism to a standstill in 2020, and the travel industry decimated in many ways – one of which is the sector lost more than 62 million jobs worldwide.

However, despite widespread layoffs across the industry, several tour operators have created jobs in the past 18 months to help clients deal with travel issues cloudy present and future.

Three tour operators, Trafalgar tours, Insight vacation and Luxury gold, have appointed wellness directors on their travels.

What exactly are they doing?

“Your role is primarily to ensure that all of our suppliers – the restaurants, the hotels, any attractions or venues we visit – all comply with local protocols.” said Melissa DaSilva, the US President of Trafalgar. “They ensure that our guests get answers to any questions they may have during their trip.”

Guy Young, President of Insight Vacations, credits Stanley Tollman, former chairman of parent company Travel Corporation, with the idea for the new job title.

“When the pandemic broke out, Mr. Tollman said we wanted to offer our guests extra comfort, extra safety and extra attention during these somewhat turbulent times,” said Young. “We wanted to make sure that we didn’t shake off the responsibility of the tour guide, which is really supposed to ensure that the trip goes smoothly and that guests have a great time.”

Young added that Insight doesn’t want the tour guides – who have always been on the company’s trips – to be distracted from the problems that have arisen during the pandemic. Travel directors, he said, have largely welcomed having an extra person to handle certain logistics, such as arranging tests for travelers returning to the United States.

How do the Wellbeing Directors deal with situations involving suppliers’ compliance with established protocols? Young said that while directors report to corporate headquarters if suppliers do not follow domestic or Insight protocols, such a scenario has not yet occurred. But if it did, an Insight representative would reach out to the hotel, restaurant, or venue to notify the site that the protocol was not being followed and try to make sure it doesn’t happen on future trips.

The tourism break led to many job cuts. Young said many well-qualified tour guides were unemployed so the company could hire them and train them to become wellness directors.

So while a representative from Travel Corporation said the number of wellbeing directors the company appoints fluctuates depending on the season and the number of trips the company makes, Young believes they have been a great addition to Insight Vacations.

“It takes away a tremendous amount of stress and worry from our guests that they might have while traveling,” said Young.

Meanwhile, another tour operator, Exodus trips, not necessarily staff, but expanded responsibilities. “We’ve had people helping us – left, right, and center – especially with safety,” said Mike James, the company’s director of product and operations, who also oversees health and safety.

As the travel industry grapples with an emerging variant of Covid that could hinder the ongoing recovery, both Insight and Exodus have expressed a willingness to create positions to ensure travelers’ safety.

“With these changes, there are opportunities for new jobs,” said Robin Brooks, the company’s marketing director.

In fact, Exodus plans to increase the number of its security specialists. The company currently has two on its payroll and plans to add a third starting January.

James said the security specialists conduct written risk assessments for each vacation from their desktops and regularly go overseas to visit their partners and review their operating standards.

“I wouldn’t say that there is always a direct correlation between the number of people working in health and safety and the safety you can hold for people,” said James. “But of course you have to be properly staffed.”

“We will never hold back health and safety recruiting. Everyone is more nervous about traveling, so we have to show that we are top of the class. ”

UPDATE: This article has been updated to take into account that Luxury Gold also uses a Wellness Director in its travels.