Victims of price gouging tours have been on the rise in recent months in South Korea, especially Seoul, as travel agencies target Chinese tourists, according to the Korean Times .
As foreign tourists return to Seoul three years after the pandemic, illegal tourism practices known as price gouging also threaten to tarnish the South Korean capital's reputation as a popular global tourist destination.
Foreign tourists often buy cosmetics and health foods when traveling to Korea.
These bargain tours are package tours where tourists are herded into stores and virtually forced to buy overpriced products such as cosmetics, nutritional supplements and duty-free items.
Aside from the obligatory shopping, a visitor's itinerary in Seoul mainly includes free-entry tourist attractions.
These unfair practices often involve illegal tour guides, mostly foreigners without valid guiding licenses. They are hired by domestic travel agencies and the main source of income for these unqualified guides is commissions from the shops.
Victims of rip-off tours appear to have increased in recent months as local travel agencies increasingly seek to exploit Chinese tourists after the government lifted a years-long ban on group tours to South Korea in August.
Earlier this month, the Seoul metropolitan government announced tough measures against price gouging tours that have damaged the city's reputation and cast a shadow over the tourism industry's post-pandemic recovery.
City officials conducted raids on major tourist sites in Jung District on October 12 and Jongno District on October 26, finding unqualified “tour guides” and “sitting guides” (legal guides who are hired to sit on tour buses, rather than actually guiding tourists), who were just fronts and appeared in case of government inspections.
City officials will conduct another on-site inspection of tourist spots in Mapo District in the coming days and further unannounced inspections of shopping malls and duty-free shops starting in November.
"The number of tourists visiting Seoul is expected to increase by the end of the year. We will continue to work hard to eradicate illegal activities to ensure that every visitor can enjoy their time here and return with happy memories of Seoul," said Kim Young-hwan, head of the Seoul Metropolitan Tourism and Sports Office.
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