Travel, online

Booking your summer holidays on the web. Europeans know it, but Italians are learning too. According to the data Unioncamere-Isnart for the Osservatorio Nazionale del Turismo (National Tourism Observatory), a million and 300thousand Italians have booked their holidays online, even while chatting on a social network.

Here some numbers:

•    85% of operators offer the opportunity to book online, using e-mails, property sites or large portals;
•    61.2% of enterprises is able to receive bookings directly online;
•    32.1% of operators uses online travel agencies;
•    19.8% of enterprises is on social networks, Facebook ranks top, in which 44.8% of the youth hostels is present, 43.6% of resorts and over 30% of 4 and 5 stars hotels.

In the first quarter of 2010, 34.5% of the guests in Italian accomodation facilities has booked online, percentage that rises to 41.3% for stays in the city. Reservations are made via direct contact with the facility through the website (12.5%), sending e-mails (15.6%) and the use of large sector's portals (6.4%).

Source and information: Unioncamere