Tour operators are responsible for operating and providing vacation through contracting, booking and packaging various components together (hotel, transportation, meals, guides, optional tours and sometimes flights).

1. Unit IV:
Tour operator
English V FC-2703 / 1321

2. What Tour Operator is?
A tour operator typically combines tour and
travel components to create a package holiday.
They advertise and produce brochures to
promote their products, holidays and itineraries.

3. What Tour Operator is?
Tour operator is an organization, firm or company that
buys individual travel components, separately from their
suppliers and combines them into a package tour, which is
sold with their own price tag to the public directly or through
middlemen.

4. What Tour Operator is?
More precise tour operators are primarily responsible for
delivering and performing the services specified in a given package
tour. They can provide these services themselves as some have
their own cars and coaches, hotels and other travel related services
or can obtain these from the other suppliers. That is why they are
called manufacturers of tourism products.

5. What Tour Operator is?
Tour operators are sometimes called as wholesalers but this is partially
true because a wholesaler buys goods and services in bulk at his own
account to prepare a tour package and then retails it through the travel
agencies or directly to clients. However, a tour operator who has his own
one or more tourists products components, (SOTC, TCI, Thomas Cook,
Indo Asia KUONI) formulates a new tourists product for example ‘inclusive
tours.’

6. What Tour Operator is?
The most common example of a tour operator's product would be a flight
on a charter airline plus a transfer from the airport to a hotel and the
services of a local representative, all for one price. Each tour operators
may specialize in destinations, e.g. Italy, activities and experiences, e.g.
skiing, or a combination of them.

7. What Tour Operator is?
The advent of the Internet has led to a rapid increase in self-
packaging of holidays. However, tour operators still have their
competence in arranging tours for those who do not have time
to do a Do It Yourself holidays (DIY), and specialize in large
group events and meetings such as conferences or seminars.

8. What Tour Operator is?
Also, tour operators still exercise contracting power with
suppliers (airlines, hotels, other land arrangements, cruise
companies and so on) and influence over other entities (tourism
boards and other government authorities) in order to create
packages and special group departures for destinations that might
otherwise be difficult and expensive to visit.

9. Types of Tour Operators
Tour operators are basically categorized
into four types. Those categories are based
on the nature of the business and their
operations.

10. Types of Tour Operators
Tour operator
Inbound tour
operators
Outbound tour
operators
Domestic tour
operators
Ground tour
operators
The operators who
receive guests,
clients/tourists and
handle arrangements
in the host country
Tour operator who
promote tours for
foreign destinations,
maybe business or
leisure tour.
Domestic tour
operators are those
who assemble,
combine tourist
components into
inclusive tours and sell
it to the domestic
travelers.
These are commonly
known as handling
agencies and their
main function is to
organize tour
arrangements for
incoming tourists on
the behalf of overseas
operators.

11. Functions of Tour Operator
Tour operator are responsible for operating and providing vacation through
contracting, booking and packaging various components together (hotel,
transportation, meals, guides, optional tours and sometimes flights). They provide
the most convenient option for tourists to stay, visit, as well as leave from the city.

12. References
Travel and tourism (2020) https://tourismnotes.com/tour-operators/
Wikipedia (2020) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tour_operator