Filipinos big on Japan

Japan is the hottest overseas travel destination for Filipinos at present, based on consumer spending tracked by global payments solution Visa.

Visa thus found it an opportune time to team up with SM Supermalls to launch a holiday campaign to promote the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, of which Visa is one of the official sponsors.

During the launch of the partnership with SM Supermalls, Visa country manager for the Philippines and Guam Dan Wolbert said that with more Filipino tourists spending their holidays in Japan, the run-up to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics would further contribute to the excitement.

“We monitor travel and where Filipinos are traveling. Right now, Japan is a very very popular travel destination,” Wolbert said, adding that next to Japan, there’s also a lot of travel to Southeast Asian destinations.

“Through this campaign, we are also able to promote the use of cashless payments in the country. This is an exciting time for Visa,” he added.
Based on the latest Visa Consumer Payment Attitudes study, two in every three Filipinos expect to increase their use of card payments over the next 12 months, saying these were more convenient, hassle-free and made it possible carry through the day without carrying cash. The ratio has increased by 28 percent from last year’s survey. In addition, two out of three respondents in the Philippines had tried going cashless and close to 60 percent had gone cashless for at least a few days.

On the campaign launched with SM Supermalls, which will run until Feb. 15, 2020, Filipino Visa cardholders who spend a minimum of P3,000 using their Visa card in participating outlets at seven participating SM super malls will have a chance to win a trip to Tokyo and attend two Olympic events in 2020.

Visa and SM will raffle off four all-expense paid trip package (each for two people) to Japan with Olympics ticket to basketball and ice skating events.
“We believe that Filipinos will be excited to get the opportunity not just to visit Japan but watch the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020,” Wolbert said.
Apart from Japan being an important travel corridor for Filipinos, Wolbert said Southeast Asia was also getting a big share of travel spending.

“There’s always a big ‍ trend to go far distances but ‍ intra-Southeast Asia tends to be very popular as well,” he said. INQ