LETTERS: Malaysians ought to be friendlier, especially with visitors, and more so with foreigners. This can be a good or bad thing. Good because the little extra effort you make is noticed, and bad when they are misunderstood.
Malaysians are friendly, but some can be rude without knowing, especially those that are least exposed to the norms of others.
Since the 1990s, I have conducted training for tourism and transport industry personnel, including frontliners such as tourist guides and taxi drivers. Some were lucky to receive generous tips or earn huge shopping commissions.
While training Teksi 1Malaysia drivers in 2014, a lady driver shared in class that she was paid RM18,000 in commissions for just bringing a foreign couple to a teak furniture shop. The couple must have bought a lot of teak furniture to be shipped home.
Last September in Langkawi, an e-hailing driver told me that another driver earned over RM30,000 in shopping commissions in just one month for taking passengers to a popular shop on the duty-free island. That happened before the Covid-19 outbreak in January 2020.
There was also the case of a taxi driver in Kuala Lumpur, whose taxi service was engaged by a foreigner for a few days. Everything must have gone exceptionally well and before flying off, the tourist offered to pay the driver the cost for a new taxi to replace the old one he was driving.
While there is no need to kill others with kindness, it pays to be friendlier, especially with visitors. Tourism frontliners should not look at foreign tourists they meet like they are nothing more than passing ships in the night, never to see them again.
They ought to adopt a strategy of getting tourists to return. They will come back for more if what they have experienced is wonderful and unforgettable. If they cannot make it during this trip, they will do so in their next trip.
Lest we forget, the greatest asset of a nation is its people, and this includes tourism. Frontliners must go out of their way to make foreign tourists feel at home in our country, similar to those that have taken up the Malaysia My Second Home programme and contributed to our economy.
Apart from being seen as friendly, it is better to treat customers as true friends, and it is not difficult for service providers to befriend clients. It is imperative to do so in the tourism industry as we are competing with our neighbours and want tourists to return repeatedly.
In Tourism Malaysia's performance report for 2019 for each quarter, the percentage of foreign tourists citing "visiting friends and relatives" as the main reason for visiting Malaysia stood at 16.6 per cent until March, 25.5 per cent (June), 19.2 per cent (September) and 9.8 per cent until December.
In fact, visiting friends and relatives in Malaysia had consistently been ranked only after holidays as the top main purpose for foreign tourists coming to our country, and many were on return visits.
Therefore, all tourism and transport frontliners must realise the important roles they play, and must befriend their customers, passengers or or guests that they get the chance to serve. Get tourists to know they have a friend in Malaysia, and you are looking forward to them returning.
And for frontliners who have served well as hosts, they would be able to confidently invite foreign tourists to come back. Tourists who have thoroughly enjoyed a great holiday in Malaysia will be sharing their experiences with co-workers, friends and relatives back home.
Y.S. CHAN
Kuala Lumpur
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times