All hotels in Belarus must enter the global booking system within 2-3 years

April 8, Novopolotsk / Diana Kurilo - BELTA /. Within the next two to three years, all hotels in Belarus should be integrated into the global online booking system. This task was set today at a meeting of the Interdepartmental Expert and Coordination Council for Tourism under the Council of Ministers (MECST), which was held in Novopolotsk, BELTA correspondent reports. Deputy Minister of Sports and Tourism Cheslav Shulga emphasized that the hotel industry needs to more actively implement IT technologies, create hotel websites where anyone can view rooms and book their preferred one in real-time. At the same time, according to the Ministry of Sports, only one in ten hotels in Belarus has a website. Moreover, only five hotel complex websites have versions in foreign languages. Cheslav Shulga also identified the lack of additional services for clients, such as ticket delivery, shoe shining, and the like, as another problem in the Belarusian hotel business. While 57% of hotels provide their clients with more than five services, a fifth of hotels offer none. Meanwhile, global practice shows that for every $1 of accommodation services, there are $5 of additional services. The quality and price of service also sometimes do not meet customer requirements. According to the participants of the MECST meeting, Belarus needs to create a legislative framework for attracting investment in hotel services. Each district center should have at least two hotels operating in different price segments. In addition, the possibility of granting legal entity status to hotels managed by the Ministry of Housing and Communal Services should be considered. It is possible that training hotels and training agro-estates will soon appear in Belarus, where middle-level staff will be trained. -0-