Visit Wales Admit They're Incompetent... Again...
Visit Wales Admit They're Incompetent... Again...
Plus this Is The Flyer I'll Be Distributing At Thursdays Visit Wales Roadshow In Newport
Please note that Wales Outdoors is on Visit Britain and on Visit Cardiff but it is banned from Visit Wales. Please note that if you search ‘walking’ on the Visit Wales website it returns just ONE guided walk provider!
Please share if relevant to you.
Here is the double sided flyer:
Earlier today I received an email from Heledd Owen at Visit Wales. She has refused all requests to meet and so to resolve these issues and has had since August 6th to engage with me, again, on the matter of Visit Wales platforming some but not others. Why today? Well, it’s the day before the first Visit Wales Roadshow that I intend to attend to leaflet delegates, network and chat to whoever will listen, and ask questions. She thanks me for my work and infers that Visit Wales has been working too. A short search of the Visit Wales website sees a handful of pages not now available but with very many still live. I’ve been here before. What follows is her letter and my immediate response. I have added a short response which includes a solution to the mess Visit Wales finds themselves in, to Dawn Bowden AM who acknowledged Heledd keeping her in the loop.
Heledd’s email to me:
Thank you for your correspondence to Visit Wales regarding the listing of providers on the Visit Wales website.
According to our policy, the companies providing various activities including guided walks need to follow our accreditation process in order to appear on our website – as part of the product database and in editorial content.
Following your various communications we have reviewed a number of entries on our database and have identified that some do require accreditation. They have been temporarily removed from our website whilst we contact the companies to work with them to undertake the necessary steps required to obtain accreditation. We’re reviewing and gathering more information on some of the other businesses featured to determine whether similar steps are required, and will take action in due course if needed.
We’re grateful to you for identifying some of the businesses that need reviewing, to ensure our approach to what companies we feature on our website and our product database is consistent. We hope these businesses will follow our accreditation process to ensure we can feature them once again in our content in future.
We regularly review all our processes and procedures, including our grading and accreditation process, to ensure they remain effective and that we deliver a high quality service and standards for all parties involved. We will consider and analyse your feedback as part of our continuous review into our processes, and will look to introduce changes if required, in order to improve the process and ensure maximum effectiveness for all stakeholders involved.
We are aware of a number of FOI requests submitted and will be responding in due course.
Heledd Owen
Dirprwy Gyfarwyddwr - Marchnata Twristiaeth a Busnes, Cymru
Deputy Director – Marketing Tourism and Business, Wales
My response to the platitudes:
This is not a game Heledd. I know why you wrote to me at 6.42 AM the day prior to the Visit Wales Roadshow in Newport. You've had, this time round, since 6th August to engage with me in a reasonable manner. But it is clear you and the Visit Wales department are unreasonable. You have a them and us mentality and have forgotten that you are a public servant. I do not stand alone with this conviction, following my discussions with many, that tourism leaders across Wales hold exactly this opinion of the Visit Wales team.
You have not apologised to me for the failure of the Visit Wales team to work to Visit Wales rules, since 2012, and more recently, despite enormous levels of communication from me, in 2020, 2021, 2022 and again in 2023. Once again, your systems are not and have never been fit for purpose despite many complaining about the far from level playing field that you seem to want to preside over.
And forgive me if I don't believe a word you say. You've said it before. Jon Munro has said it. Lesley Beaumont has said it. Glyn Roberts has said it. Your words are meaningless unless there is action and I do not see action at this point in time.
I have checked a few of the businesses and copy that I sent you and most are still live. I've also reviewed the links previously sent and pages previously discussed, in 2022, and I have found that they are still live too.
Specific questions I have asked, asked on 19th August, remain unanswered, in particular:
'You say 'Adventure is where the focus is on engaging with the natural environment in a physically challenging manner where skill and an element of risk are central to the experience' Are you stating walking on a public footpath falls into this category? Please clarify whether walking on a public footpath in lowland countryside is adventurous and risky or not?'
'Please clarify the mechanism that came to the conclusion that 30 minutes from the vehicle rule ought to be a thing. Please provide me with the written documentation that spells this out and the dates that this was implemented.'
Deleting a couple of businesses will not see the back of me. I was assured by you and Jon, in 2022, that you would review the protocol for allowing professional guided walk leaders onto the Visit Wales platform OR remove all unaccredited businesses and links in copy and walking festivals etc from the Visit Wales website. It's a simple thing and is a thing that Visit Wales has claimed to be doing since May 2020. That's why we are here. You haven't done what you said you would do. This has resulted in a great deal of time and effort on my part whilst suffering years of being disadvantaged in the tourism marketplace by your platforming of my competitors.
Your refusal to meet has resulted in god knows how much time and so much cost to the taxpayer on FOI's, legal advice and meetings. But you know what? I don't care. You should have implemented the outcomes we discussed and got your house in order following my court action and our subsequent meeting in 2022.
I submitted a new listing form for Wales Outdoors on 1st October. I have been informed that my request to be listed as an attraction, in line with the multiple similar businesses that still exist on Visit Wales, has been refused. That without me even submitting any content. Please explain. Shouldn't the protocol be to allow listing requests and then look at the content? Is Wales Outdoors banned?
Finally, When searching the term walking only one guided walk provider is returned, for the whole of Wales. This is disgraceful, especially as I have been complaining about just this matter since May 2020 and in the year of the 'Wales By Trails' campaign and following the 10th anniversary of the Wales Coast Path in 2022. Further there remain multiple listings by the same businesses, something that I was assured would be looked at in... 2012. You must surely realise that your protocols are not fit for purpose? That accommodation providers need guided walk providers to add value to stays in Wales, to ensure glowing feedback, recommendations and repeat business? I expect you to look once again at your protocols and find a way to include us. I've sent Visit Wales a bombproof and easy to implement new protocol many times. That or be prepared to stand in front of the tourism industry in Wales and explain why almost all guided walk providers are not listed on the Visit Wales platform.
My email to Dawn Bowden AM:
Dear Dawn,
I am glad you are being kept in the loop.
I would like to reiterate that engagement is the best option for all in this matter and that huge efforts on behalf of the Welsh Government and the associated costs to the taxpayer, huge efforts on my part and the inclusion in this matter of my MP and AM and their time could have all been avoided in the first instance if Visit Wales had done their job years ago, as was repeatedly promised, or that I was taken seriously by anyone employed by the Welsh Government at the start of August this year.
I am assuming that you have read my response of this morning to Heledd? I expect the questions, first raised on 16th August, to be answered and indeed that each paragraph is dealt with and resolved.
You should take particular note of the years of obfuscation, lies and misdirection I've received from Visit Wales staff and still without an apology, the banning of my business from listing on the platform, my continued demand for cleaning up of the platform and so the removal of all unaccredited tourism businesses that offer guiding in the countryside that takes their clients more than 30 minutes from the guides vehicle, and the consequences of that last point, that there are no guided walk providers, bar one, available on the Visit Wales website, for the whole of Wales. If work promised is completed there will also be no walking festivals and no content linking out to providers. Of course many guides continue to hide under the category attraction, which is why I have been so energetic in pursuing Visit Wales this time round. They knew about this as I highlighted some of these businesses back in 2021.
This last point should have you confused. Isn't Visit Wales a tourism portal for Wales? Isn't it there to provide quality information to visitors, encouraging stay extensions, great feedback and referrals? It's not a good look Dawn. And that is the point here. Visit Wales protocols for adventure activities ought not to apply to guides.
I don't suppose you've been shown this, my simple solution, offered to Visit Wales back in 2022, detailing a new bombproof protocol for including all qualified guided walk providers onto the site, sent October 2022:
In my opinion VisitWales ought to see experience providers as different to traditional adventure activity providers and different to accommodation providers. I work within the law and I am qualified and insured for what I do. What then is there not to like?
I do hope that businesses like mine can therefore be listed on the VisitWales website by the end of this year.
The tick box exercise you ought to be asking is simply something like this...
Do you deliver a licensable activity
if yes go to the accreditation process or evidence your license
if no
Do all staff hold relevant qualifications for the experiences that you deliver
if yes please upload digital evidence
if no then unfortunately VisitWales cannot list your business
if yes
Please upload a digital copy of your insurance along with the expiry date
Please supply links to at least two live review sites for your business - we will link to these in your business profile on VisitWales. Those with a star rating of under 4 out of 5 across the ratings sites will not gain access to the VisitWales platform.
Airbnb
TripAdvisor/Viator
Get Your Guide
Musement
That should be the gateway and then of course the standard business profile form could be accessed and could not go live until the above submissions are checked.
What are your thoughts on this as a solution?
