The Department of Marketing of UTAR Faculty of Business and Finance (FBF) organised an online talk titled “Introduction to Travel Consultancy” on 10 March 2023 via Microsoft Teams.  The webinar saw more than 60 participants consisting of staff and students.

The speaker, Dr Janice Chan Poh Yuet is the managing director of PY Chan Consultancy and she has more than 20 years of industrial experience in conventional and Islamic banking. Also, having involved in the tourism industry, she has established a tourism college and collaborations with travel agencies and hotels to yield well-trained personnel in the hospitality industry. In addition, Dr Chan is the External Relations Deputy Director of Tunku Abdul Rahman University of Management and Technology (TAR UMT), Kuala Lumpur.

The talk “Introduction to Travel Consultancy” aimed to highlight the essential topics that a travel consultant in Malaysia would need to be familiar with. These include reservation and ticketing, inbound and outbound operations, tour coordination and leader duties, as well as sales and marketing.

She began by briefly introducing the tourism industry in Malaysia. She said, “The tourism industry contributes 12.8 per cent to Malaysia’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) - one of the largest contributors. In terms of employment, 2021 statistics showed that the tourism sector absorbed 23.4 per cent of employment. Therefore, tourism is considered as a very stable industry. Tourism is also Malaysia’s second largest foreign exchange earner that works on Malaysia’s economy positively.”

According to Dr Chan, there are four major types of tourism, namely gastronomical, medical, leisure, and business tourism. She also highlighted five major players in the tourism industry which included accommodation, food and beverage services, recreation and entertainment, transportation and travel services.

While enlightening participants on the career path in tourism, Dr Chan said, “Individuals with knowledge or skill-based learning can involve in the tourism industry. Despite having good academic qualifications, an interested individual has to go through industrial training to have an acute awareness of the jobs in the tourism industry. After the internship, students are required to sit for an exam to be qualified as tour guides. Some of the tour guide duties are tour assignment acceptance; tour arrangement reconfirmation; tourist arrival executions; tour commentary delivery, and tour itinerary execution.”

The talk concluded with an insightful Q&A session, followed by a group photo-taking session.