The Samoa Tourism Authority (STA) welcomes feedback and its staff are ready to respond to queries from tourists.

Responding to recent concerns by tourists on the lack of brochures on local tourist attractions, Leituala Joseph Chan Ting, of the authority’s marketing department said they are currently short of brochures and pamphlets, but their staff are ready to respond to queries from tourists. 

“Our job is to offer advise not only here, but also at the airport centre,” he said. “Information on hotels, tours, rates and cultural shows: we provide all that to the visitors, unless they come asking but we’re short on brochures and pamphlets. Otherwise our staff are well equipped to answer questions regarding activities, locations and such,” he said. 

Local tour operators and hotel owners were also encouraged to drop off their information leaflets, which Leituala said can be distributed to tourists and visitors. 

“We have so many brochures and timetables for ferry trips, taxi fare booklets from LTA and systems in place to help our visitors. We also encourage our tour operators and hotel operators to bring in their information so people can easily find them, so whatever queries our visitors may have, it doesn’t stop our work on the daily basis, we just wished they brought it up with us directly.”

While the STA tries its best to offer updated information such as maps, their services are also determined by how much funding is available.

“We can’t overly try to produce and provide updated information without money to put it into action, so we try and manage our funds properly for other activities,” he said.

Leituala said their recently commissioned cultural booklet guide – which their team produced – has information on all cultural shows offered by hotels around the island.

“You know that helps better the experience of our visitors as well as promote products and services done by our local industry,” he added. 

“We’re always marketing Samoa as ‘Beautiful Samoa’. Its our brand and so the Government together with STA is constantly working towards making Samoa better to fit our brand which is a working progress. But everything depends on the budget,” he said.