However, he concluded that personal or workplace characteristics could not be
used as good predictors of such different risk perceptions. Also, his findings
suggest that the exposure to media and past experience of travel agents are con-
tributing factors for their understanding of the characteristics and level of risk per-
ception (Lovelock, 2003, p. 274). Moreover, Lovelock claimed that travel agents
are often caught between two sets of ethics: the humanitarian
one that advocates
not sending tourists to dangerous destinations, and the business ethic that calls for
a hard sell regardless of the risk involved (Lovelock, 2003, p. 277). In times when
the travel agency sector has been experiencing many business obstacles, mainly in
the form of commission cuts and fierce competition, there is a high probability that
travel agents will lean toward business survival over their customers’ safety.
Therefore, though it is clear that travel agents can act as a possible information
channel of security related information, it is currently impossible to conclude to
what extent they
can be perceived as a reliable, updated, and comprehensive source
by their customers. If this is the case, should the tourism industry still rely on travel
agents as a reliable and effective information provider in times of security induced
crisis? In light of the hitherto mentioned business and ethical limitations, some
kind of more rigorous security information provider should be considered.
On the wholesale level it has also been expected that tour operators, who are in
charge of designing and putting together the tourist product, will avoid selling
high-security-risk destinations. Through their promotional material, they are also
expected to make the customer aware of the potential of
experiencing security sit-
uations and the ways to avoid them (Cavlek, 2002; Lovelock, 2003). In some coun-
tries, such as within the EU, tour operators bear a legal responsibility with regard
to their clients’ safety and security (Cavlek, 2002). Thus, their safety obligation to
their customers is not a case of moral responsibility but rather a legal requirement.
Consequently, tour operators must take any possible measures to avoid the expo-
sure of their clients to any kind of safety and security risk. Hence, in times of secu-
rity crises, they will be the first to react and will either evacuate their guests,
exclude the affected destination from their travel brochures, stop operation in des-
tinations already
included in their products, or temporarily relocate their traveling
clients (Cavlek, 2002). It is important to appreciate the consequences of such steps
since tour operators are an important link in the tourism chain production. They
are in charge of producing the opportunities for mass tourism to travel and reach
destinations worldwide. As such, they have enormous economic power, influenc-
ing not only tourist experiences, but also the economic wealth of destinations.
Therefore, the safety and security image they convey could have a major impact
on affected destinations.
The fact is that generally the large international tour operators have always
preferred the easier solution, namely, to call off operations in affected destina-
tions until the security crisis is over. This kind of step was normally explained as a
normative reaction to travel warnings issued by government
agencies in the gener-
ating markets (Cavlek, 2002). Such a strategy protects tour operators from the
legal consequences and in some cases prevents surging insurance premiums. But,
at the same time, it might create major damage to its reputation when it faces frus-
trated clients who could not fulfill their travel plans just because their tour opera-
tors refused to be exposed to potential legal action. Moreover, the money lost as a
result of hampering operations with a given affected destination can be detrimen-
tal to the tour operator. On top of these potential losses, Cavlek (2002) mentions
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another interesting constraint that might convince tour
operators to maintain oper-
ation in affected destinations instead of canceling them. She claims that in some
cases, tour operators feel more committed to affected destinations. This commit-
ment most often stems from vertical integration that puts tour operators in the gen-
erating markets under the same umbrella of ownership as tour operations, hotels,
and other tourist services in the receiving destinations. This fact, according to
Calvek (2002), explains why Turkey and Spain were not dropped out altogether
from the major European tour operators’ brochures, despite being hit by recent
terror activities (Calvek, 2002, p. 486).
To sum up this section, despite the general understanding of the role and func-
tion of the above analyzed security information, not
much has been written on the
way that security information is conveyed and to what extent it actually shapes
tourists’ travel behavior (Lawton and Page, 1997; Lovelock, 2003). Moreover,
since there are no comparative studies examining tourists’ use of security related
travel information from different information sources, a few important research
questions still remain open. Thus, it is still unclear how tourists’ background, loca-
tion, and situation shape their search and consumption of security information.
Furthermore, it is important to further explore the relative importance of the avail-
able security information sources and to try to ascertain which of them is perceived
to be more accurate and more reliable by tourists of different backgrounds. In order
to lay the foundation
for these research directions, there is first a need to concep-
tualize tourists’ choices at each stage of the travel sequence, and to understand
what security information they need in order to control their perceived risk and
thus successfully pursue their travel plans. This conceptual framework will be dis-
cussed in the next section.
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