Tourist check-in and check-out data are important to achieve the goals of tourist boards.
According to the current Act on Tourist Boards (NN 152/2008), common goals of tourist boards are defined, which are achieved at each level of the Tourist Board.
The first level is the Tourist Board of the municipality and city (or area), the second the County Tourist Board and the third, the Croatian National Tourist Board.
Key group of data for achieving the goals of the Tourist Board
One of the key data sets that are the basis for achieving these goals is the data concerning the applications for tourists. Therefore, the law also specifies the specific tasks and activities of the Tourist Board of the municipality, city and place.
• monitoring check-in and check-out of tourists
• keeping a unique list of tourists for the area of the municipality or city, mainly to control the collection of sojourn tax and professional data processing
• daily collection, weekly and monthly processing of data on tourist traffic in the area of the municipality or city
• checking and collecting data on tourists applications in order to cooperate with the competent inspection bodies in the supervision of the calculation, collection and payment of sojourn tax
• establishment of a unique tourist information system, tourist check-in and check-out system and statistical processing
In addition, the Tourist Board of the municipality and the city, according to the law on sojourn tax, is obliged to enable the payers of the sojourn tax to pay the sojourn tax directly in the tourist office and to enable their registration in the tourist office.
The Istria Tourist Board commissioned a project from Istra information engineering from Pula in 1995 and carried out the computerization of these activities. The goals of the above are to increase the efficiency of the Tourist Board, long-term reduction of costs and efficient control of the obligation and payment of sojourn tax and membership fees, as the main sources of income of the Tourist Board system.
By 1998, about 50 tourist boards in the country had already used the sotware of Istra information engineering, and today it is used by over 130 offices. This is 35% of all tourist boards in the country, and in whose territory over 65% of total arrivals and overnight stays in the country are realized.
The software enabled the Tourist Board to know in advance how much each taxpayer has to pay sojourn taxes and how much of it he has paid. In that way, it is possible to more efficiently control and collect the sojourn tax, and thus increase the income of the Tourist Board.
On one side, tourist registration data are obtained from each person obliged to register (electronically or manually). On the other side (FINA), residence tax payment data of the same taxpayer are obtained.
In addition, detailed data on the structure of the exemption or reduction of the sojourn tax payment have enabled better insight and control in this area, as well.
Detailed statistical data on guests and their stays, enable the development of quality plans for the promotion of the destination, as well as the analysis of their success.
Early in 1995, it was possible to submit data on tourist registration in the Tourist Board electronically (then via floppy diskettes, and later via the Internet).
However, for a long time, this possibility was used only by legal entities (hotels, camps, agencies, …), but not by private renters.
Problems of the traditional procedure of guest registration
Numerous taxpayers (especially private renters, of whom there are 55.000 in Croatia today) registered guests directly at the Tourist Board office.
Also, the staff at the Tourist Board had to enter hundreds (smaller Tourist Boards) and some thousands of reports (large Tourist Boards) into the computer daily during the season, which caused the following problems:
• the working hours of permanent employees of the Tourist Board were significantly spent
• often required additional employment of permanent or seasonal workers
• renters created crowds in the offices of the Tourist Board and made it difficult to provide information and services to guests and perform other tasks of the Tourist Board
In addition, renters themselves, especially those further away from the TZ office, spent significant time and money to register guests.
With increasing Internet usage among renters, Istra information engineering in 2007 developed Internet Web Services (Cloud, SaaS) for check-in guests in tourist boards via the Web.
Through this service, an initial 60.000 registrations were made in 2008 by 1.400 renters in 10 tourist boards.
In 2011, 330.000 applications were made from 6.120 renters from 30 turist boards (over 11% of all renters in CRO).
The use of this system has significantly reduced the costs of 30 tourist boards and drastically reduced the crowds of renters in their offices.
In 2012, the system www.PrijavaTurista.com was leased by 47 tourist offices (50% more than in 2011).
Following the above, it is expected that at the end of this year, the registration of tourists via the Web will be used by over 30% of all renters in Croatia. Through them, about a million registrations will be made.
Davor Brenko, dipl. ing.
“Catering and tourism, 06 / 2012”