Work Values, Travel Satisfaction, and Organizational Injustice as Antecedents of Corporate Travel Policy Compliance

Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, business travel spending is expected to reach two-thirds of the pre-pandemic levels in 2022. Therefore, travel policies remain essential for reducing travel expenses and managing traveller behaviour. A significant challenge for a company is to ensure compliance with its travel policy. This study uses the equity theory and person-organization fit model to understand non-compliance with travel policies. Two hundred and five responses were collected from corporate travellers employed in South Africa via an online survey. The results revealed that work values and perceived organizational injustice could influence corporate travel policy compliance. This study is the first to investigate the influence of work values, travel satisfaction, and organizational injustice on unethical decision-making and behaviour in a corporate travel context

Millennials as potential creative tourists in South Africa:A CHAID approach to market segmentation

Creative tourism has recently emerged as an important area of tourism development, particularly in the Global North. In the Global South, studies of the profile of creative tourists and their motives for partaking in creative tourism are limited. This paper investigates creative tourism demand among South African millennials, analysing what motivates their participation and developing a descriptive consumer profile. CHAID analysis was used for segmentation, revealing a group with a high participation intention and a second group with a low probability of creative tourism participation. Creative tourism intentions were linked to knowledge acquisition, skills and escape motivations, and demographic characteristics including relationship status and gender. Respondents were more likely to participate in domestic rather than international creative tourism, indicating the potential for creative tourism development in South Africa. The findings could help managers and policymakers meet the needs of creative tourists, addressing shortfalls in product development, experience design and marketing

Mobile business travel application usage : are South African men really from Mars and women from Venus?

PURPOSE : Research abounds highlighting the differences between males and females when they travel. Even in business travel, these differences have been acknowledged, with suppliers and marketers spending significant money to develop and market products to accommodate them. The purpose of this study is to ascertain whether differences exist in terms of mobile application usage between male and female business travellers. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH : A mixed method approach is followed. An internet-based survey is distributed and in-depth interviews conducted with South African business travellers. The Mann–Whitney U-test is used to test the differences between males and females and their mobile application usage. Content analysis is used to analyse the interviews. FINDINGS : The results show that mobile applications are perceived as more important by females than males in all the phases of the travel cycle, although most of these differences in perceived importance were not significant. RESEARCH LIMITATIONS/IMPLICATIONS : Owing to the online data-collection method and the self-selective process, the findings cannot be generalised to the global population of business travellers who use mobile applications. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS : The results should caution corporate organisations, travel management companies and their application developers not to spend unnecessary technological and financial resources on developing applications to accommodate differences between males and females, which might not exist. Companies should rather spend money on developing applications that will enhance and add convenience to the business traveller’s experience. ORIGINALITY/VALUE : The main contribution of this study lies in investigating the applications market, particularly in the context of business travel. Applications focussed on specific sectors of the tourism industry, such as business travel applications, serve business travellers differently from generic travel applications. This research examines business travel-specific applications and expands the scale and scope of the enquiry, concentrating on the travellers’ view.https://www.emerald.com/insight/publication/issn/1757-9880hj2020Tourism Managemen

A customer-focused approach to distribution : the case of SANParks

While the importance of distribution has been recognised in tourism literature, the research has been approached mainly from the perspective of supply, with very little attention given to the customer. To date, there has been even less focus on the distribution channel requirements of the National Park customers. The purpose of this study is to examine how the various distribution channels used by South African National Parks (SANParks) go towards satisfying the customers’ distribution channel requirements and identifying whether there is any relationship between certain variables, such as gender or the frequency of channel use, and the level of satisfaction that customers experience with the various channels. Web-based and paper-based questionnaires are distributed to the customers who have used the SANParks distribution channels before. The results show that, although the SANParks website is the most frequently used channel for making a booking, it is not necessarily the channel with which customers are most satisfied; in fact, they are more satisfied with the satellite walk-in reservation offices and satellite call centres. While the majority of the research studies in the context of tourism distribution channels have shown the importance and popularity of electronic distribution channels among customers, this paper cautions SANParks not to assume the distribution channel requirements of their customers and urges them to continually assess their distribution strategies and to become more customer-focused in their approach.http://www.sajems.org/am2016Tourism Managemen

A survey of corporate travellers in South Africa : towards a model for travel policy compliance

A travel management programme allows an organisation to manage corporate travel expenditure, and through a well-formulated travel policy, to control its travel expenses. Traveller non-compliance of the travel policy is an increasing area of concern with surveys conducted amongst travellers showing various reasons for non-compliance, both deliberate and unknowing. This study goes beyond established reasons and argues that non-compliance may also be the result of underlying factors not yet fully investigated or recognised by management and industry in general. Two broadly conceptualised factors that influence travel policy compliance are identified. The first is termed corporate related factors and the second, personal related factors. The overall purpose of this study was to conceptualise and test a model of travel policy compliance based on these factors. To achieve this, a literature review as well as empirical research was conducted. Finally, a conceptual model for policy compliance was proposed which served as the framework for the empirical research and from which hypotheses were derived and tested. The empirical research was conducted as a formal, descriptive and explanatory study. Corporate travel management, Travel Management Companies (TMCs) and corporate travellers made up the target populations of the study. Non-probability sampling methods, namely purposive and convenience sampling were used in this study. The researcher used qualitative as well as quantitative methods to gather data. In depth interviews and the Delphi technique, a qualitative method; was used to collect data from TMCs and management for the purpose of establishing an exhaustive list of possible determinants of policy non-compliance. Quantitative methods used to collect data from corporate travellers included self-administered, structured questionnaires. A multinomial logistic regression modelling technique was used to test the conceptual model in order to identify the factors that have the most significant influence on policy compliance. A limitation of the study within which data analysis occurred was the low response rate. This limitation was taken into account in the interpretation of the results and the recommendations. The study shows a number of significant results and as such provides a valuable contribution to the corporate travel literature by being the first study of its kind to measure the impact of factors not previously identified. This study shows that travel policy non-compliance within organisations needs to be viewed at a much deeper level than previously considered. The results show corporate-related factors such as an ineffective travel policy, lacking control measures and perceived organisational injustice have a significant influence on policy compliance. Personal related factors such as self-interest could also impact policy compliance significantly. The results should enable corporate travel management to identify factors within their organisations that could lead to non-compliance. The implementation of the tested model could lead to a higher compliance rate within organisations and ultimately to considerable cost-savings.Thesis (DCom)--University of Pretoria, 2009.Tourism Managementunrestricte

Constraints to consumption of South Africa's national parks among the emerging domestic tourism market

Tourism plays a recognised role in the South African economy, even though it is faced with a number of challenges including levels of seasonality, geographic spread and differing levels of travel and tourism culture within population groups. Literature speaks to the role that domestic tourism can play in addressing these challenges. Within the South African context, emerging markets are population groups entering the market in increasing numbers as domestic tourists, especially those previously neglected during the years of segregation through apartheid. The focus of this exploratory study was to identify the constraints that deter the South African emerging black domestic market from visiting national parks, and more specifically the Kruger National Park. A survey of 350 individuals support existing literature, but highlight the importance of time, distance and affordability as constraints to this market. The study identifies areas in which products could be adapted, as well as aspects that could be considered when formulating marketing messages aimed at this market.http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cdsa20am201

Measuring Kruger visitors’ place attachment to specific camps

Tourists become emotionally, physically and socially attached to national parks as they become familiar with the park’s settings and endow it with value. Researchers have pointed out that place attachment leads to environmentally responsible behaviour and higher levels of visitor satisfaction. Therefore, increasing the level of attachment that visitors feel is vital for park and camp managers, and to do so a greater understanding of the various dimensions of it is needed. While attachment to parks has been evaluated previously, attachment to specific camps in parks has not been done. The main purpose of this research study was to measure the extent to which visitors to the Tamboti and Satara camps in the Kruger National Park feel attached to these camps. We also determined whether differences exist between visitors in terms of the level of attachment that they experience towards these camps. Finally, we established the variables that influence place attachment. A self-administered paper-based questionnaire was distributed to visitors to the Tamboti and Satara camps, with 201 questionnaires completed. The results show that visitors generally have a neutral feeling towards the camps. Furthermore, the differences in visitors’ levels of attachment could be attributed to their nationality, wild card membership and frequency of visits. Various managerial implications are drawn and recommendations made on how to increase place attachment to these camps. Conservation implications: This results indicate that visitors do not show particularly strong attachment towards Tamboti and Satara. Recommendations are given for camp managers to increase place attachment to the camps. If camp managers can succeed in fostering stronger levels of attachment to these camps, visitors are more likely to display environmentally responsible behaviour in the camps, with positive conservation implications

Understanding visitor expectations for responsible tourism in an iconic national park: Differences between local and international visitors

A survey on expectations for responsible tourism was administered to 201 visitors to the iconic Kruger National Park, comprising 55% South African nationals and 45% international tourists. Using Likert-scale questions, respondents were invited to indicate the level of importance they attached to 38 aspects of responsible tourism. Space was also provided for open comments. Conservation of biodiversity and geological features were rated very highly by both groups while aspects related to the local community, though considered important overall, were ranked lowest overall, with international tourists rating this category as more important than South Africans. Aspects related to traffic and access were rated to be more important by South Africans, probably because they mostly self-drive while international visitors rely more on organised game drives. Visual and aesthetic features of camps, as well as energy, water and waste management were all considered very important by all respondents, with members of both groups making further suggestions for improvement. This suggests that visitors are supportive of low environmental impact tourism in the Kruger National Park. In light of the strategic goal of South African National Parks to increase visitor numbers, it will be important that this goal is achieved without compromising sound environmental performance

Visitor information centres’ contribution towards creating memorable visitor experiences

Information exchange is a process through which information, experience and skills are exchanged among stakeholders. While studies acknowledge the role of VICs in enhancing memorable visitor experiences, it remains unclear how the experiences that visitors have at VICs contributes to the dimensions of Kim, Ritchie & McCormick’s (2012) Memorable Tourism Experience (MTE) (hedonism, novelty, local culture, refreshment, meaningfulness, involvement, and knowledge). The pur5pose of the paper is to ascertain whether the experiences that visitors have at VICs contribute to their memorable experiences at visited areas. The paper also intends to determine the factors in the VIC experience that are statistically significant predictors of visitors’ experience of the dimensions of MTE A total of 152 self-completed, structured questionnaires were collected from visitors to government-owned VICs in South Africa. The results show that the experience that visitors have at VICs contributes to the dimensions of MTE at visited areas. More specifically, vistors’ experience of VIC information quality, information resources, ICTs, staff knowledge and customer service contributed to the MTE at visited areas. The results are important in enabling VICs to create an environment that contributes to memorable visitor experiences at visited areas. They will help VIC managers to fulfill their enhancement and information provision function by delivering experiences in VICs that contribute to memorable experience at visited areas and in turn encourage visitors’ intention to revisit these areas.http://www.ajhtl.comam2023Tourism Managemen

Regional competitiveness: an emerging domestic market segment perspective

Regional competitiveness and domestic tourism is increasingly important for a sustainable tourism economy at national level. The development of a competitive provincial index for the South African emerging domestic market is under scrutiny/investigation. Provincial competitiveness is a province’s ability to optimize its attractiveness for domestic tourists by offering quality, innovative and attractive tourism services to gain domestic market share, while ensuring that available resources supporting tourism are used efficiently and in a sustainable way. Competitiveness at provincial level will ultimately result in national competitiveness as issues of supply are addressed (at local level). Factors and indicators relevant to selected regions/provinces/destinations are empirically identified through focus groups and a sample of 1065 emerging tourists in eight provinces of South Africa. A Tourism and Travel Market Indicators Index consisting of nine validated factors are proposed that can be used to compare the competitiveness of regions based on factors most relevant to the domestic market