Taipei, Dec. 27, 2012 (CENS)--At the invitation of the Agricultural Bank of China, 300 Chinese VIP holders of China UnionPay Card will arrive in Taiwan for free independent trip lasting four days and three nights. Those card holders, each with millions of NT dollar of card-spending capability, have booked the entire sea-food restaurant on the 86th floor of Taipei 101 for New Year eve party, at NT$6 million of cost. Industry insiders said that these visitors boast the strongest spending power since the government permits Chinese mainlanders to make free independent trip on the island.
The Tourism Bureau expressed yesterday (Dec. 26) that this is the first banking incentive trip, in the form of free independent trip, which testifies to the capability of Taiwan to develop sophisticated and tailor-made free independent trip.
The trip is arranged by Lion Travel Agency, which will receive the 300 China UnionPay golden or platinum card holders, each with card-spending quota of several millions of NT dollars. Most of them are medium and high-level corporate managers and owners of small and medium enterprises.
Lion Travel pointed out that according to the individual wishes of those tourists, the company has made arrangements for them to visit such hot tourism spots as Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, the Presidential Office, Jiufen, and Jinguashi.
A dinner party will take place for those tourists on the night of Dec. 31 at a sea-food restaurant on the 86th floor of Taipei 101, featuring various performances, at a total cost of NT$6 million.
In recent years, the number of group Chinese tourists shot up but the travel quality is often inadequate, leading to acute competition. Many local restaurants have turned down group Chinese travelers, due to the low margin, and switched their focus to free independent travelers.
Since the opening up of free independent trip for Chinese mainlanders one year ago, the number of Chinese free independent travelers to Taiwan had topped 190,000 as of November 30.