Annals of the University of Oradea: Economic Science (Jul 2014)

THE ROMANIAN CONSUMER PROFILES IN PROCESSING ONLINE BOOKINGS

  • Lacurezeanu Ramona,
  • Chis Alexandru,
  • Moca Mircea,
  • Stanca Liana

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 23, no. 1
pp. 341 – 346

Abstract

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Tourism is considered [WTTC] one of the top three industries as importance in the global economy of the 21st century. With the development of information technology and electronic commerce, the electronic (online) booking seems to be a popular way to facilitate access to certain goods and tourism services via the Internet. The literature clearly indicates that online booking vacations, transportation and other services related to tourism package developed and diversified nearly at the same degree with advances made in Information Technology and Communication (ITC). However, “there are wide variations in online usage levels between different countries … Australian’s online usage is 44 % and Spain’s online usage is 14% from all transactions” [online-booking from WCT]. Regarding the consumer profile using 'online booking ', the literature does not provide a generally accepted set of evaluation attributes. In the world is talking today about "Generation Y", in other words about those who have reached maturity in the early millennium. Basically it's about consumers born between 1980 and 1995, hence with ages between 18 and 33 years. In this context, in our exploratory research we conducted a statistical study on students, tomorrow's economic specialists with knowledge in ITC from minimal to advanced levels. The hypothesis of the study are: a. Humans with advanced computer skills using the Internet for booking holidays; b. Humans with low ITC skills choose the classical method of booking holidays by contacting a tour company. The results of our survey showed that the choice of online tools for booking holidays becomes an increasingly used method in Romania but consumers still lack confidence in the online environment. This phenomenon often motivates the consumers to contact a tour company regardless of their ITC skills or travel experience. We also proved that there is no strong connection between people with good ITC knowledge and the employment of online booking as well as between the tourism experts and booking through tour companies. Our study shows that: on-line booking for Y Generation is not an independent process, but is considered a stage of the process of making reservations for travel packages.

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