The plans for holidays in the pandemic were already difficult for holidaymakers in 2020, but it doesn't seem to be a bit easier in 2021.

Ingo Burmester, head of Central Europe at the travel agent DER Touristik from the Rewe Group, admits that the infection process and assessments of travel countries have become more difficult to predict.

"That increases the guest's uncertainty."

Timo Kotowski

Editor in business.

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Business is diminished by uncertainties, but they didn't come as a surprise.

The CEO of the market leader TUI, Fritz Joussen, spoke last summer about months of uncertainty and a pandemic in waves.

“Travel warnings come and go.

I'm not assuming that this will change much in winter, ”he said at the congress of the tourism trade magazine FVW.

Very few viewers in the industry are likely to have feared that almost a year later the ups and downs of the incidence are still going on.

Booking figures show no mass rush

At the end of May, according to tourism market researcher TDA, the booking revenues of German tour operators had reached around 25 percent of the pre-crisis level.

Falling incidences and rescheduled bookings led to a demand that was higher in June than seldom before this month.

But all in all, the backlog remains.

Skeptics are now concerned about whether a third of the pre-crisis value will still be reached in summer.

On the one hand, more and more people are vaccinated against corona diseases - according to the Robert Koch Institute, 43 percent of the German population have received the full vaccination.

On the other hand, the delta variant causes incidences to skyrocket.

The booking statistics do not show a mass rush to all Mediterranean beaches.

According to DER manager Burmester, citizens also lose track of things.

Mallorca was again classified as a risk area at the end of last week, a test or vaccination certificate is now required for the return journey.

But that was already the case for air passengers.

The federal government also wants to provide more clarity.

With a new entry regulation, which should come into force on July 28th, rules should be easier to understand - but not looser.

The draft from the Ministry of Health stipulates that from now on every person from the age of six who - regardless of where - comes to Germany must have proof of test, vaccination or recovery with them.

Even the travel industry had complained that it had been different so far.

The German Travel Association (DRV) described it as “incomprehensible” that returnees from non-risk areas were allowed to do without the evidence required by air passengers in the car.

The work of the federal police, which carries out random checks, should also become easier: The officials are no longer faced with the question of whether a car driver has set off in the non-risk area of ​​Austria or in a Balkan country with a higher incidence.

The general obligation to provide evidence is intended to make it superfluous to classify countries as "simple" risk areas; regions highlighted as high-risk and virus variant areas remain.

Opposition to this part of the new regulation is hardly to be expected.