info please.....Tour guides and licensing

Hi all,

Just wondering if you have to take a licensing course to be authorized as a tour guide and/or tourist transporter.

We are thinking of moving down, and are seriously considering starting up an "english" language tour van (2-6 of them) to do tours or even just transportation of north american tourists from beach to beach. I am in Canada, and the most common mention that I get is there is no well spoken english "guides" or drivers around. All you ever get at the resorts are the locals that really don't understand all that much of the english language. I have already spoken to a few of these fellows that have driven us around, and they were very optimistic of this type of a venture.

This is something that my wife and I are thinking of doing ourselves with our daughter and a couple of locals in the DR already, and would eventually be looking to hire well spoken dominicans (as in well spoken english) to be drivers as well.

Any suggestions would help. Thanks very much in advance.

hoppy

Re: Watch Out for the Unions

ricktoronto said:

The tour thing is one thing but I had an old retired American guy who used to act as a taxi for us when we came and boy did he get a lot of hassle and threats from the "real" taxi drivers for stealing business. I have no idea how you get in with that group but I'd be cautious.

I resume you've been to the DR so many times you can act as a tour guide?

Click to expand...

Actually, we do feel quite comfortable with the North Coast area. We are quite knowledgeable about pretty much any of these towns along the road, the tourist areas, the most beautiful places, and of course the beaches. We know quite a few of the nicest and/or customer experienced restaurants and their owners and staff.

It is not so much of an issue of cutting a locals business, but in fact is an alternative for the tourists that do come from Canada and the US that don't have a certain comfort level with their own spanish, and their lack of faith in the "real" taxi drivers.

I have met and used quite a few of these drivers, and for what it's worth, they do not have the language skills to make these people comfortable on their drives. It seems that one of the most common probs is they always feel like they (Mr. or Mrs. Tourist) haven't got across what they wanted to with these people.

The other very common problem is that when they do venture into Puerto Plata or the other North Coast towns for the "tour" they are set up with other "guides" that are hanging out in Central Park or elsewhere that drag these people around to the shops and restaurants that only spiff the "guides" for bringing in business. Not to mention the $10-$30US these people get asked for at the end of their two-three hours of walkabout. Most of these fellows start at $50US at the end of their tour and the tourists then find themselves in a situation that they have to argue with these guys. Believe me, I have seen it many times myself. If you give them $10 US you now have to put up with their guilt trips so most of the time, they end up getting way too much for what they actually did.

We are catering to the english speaking community of travellers with full or partial or completely improvised mornings, afternoons, evenings or even full day assistance. We would go where they want to go. We would be able to tell them what the best way of doing things in the DR is and we would be customer satisfaction based.

Sorry for the long drawn out speech. Have a great day everyone and thanks for the info as it comes.

Hoppy