Safety Most Important When Booking, Holidaymakers Say

Most holidaymakers now cite safety as the key issue when booking a holiday.

Nearly eight out of 10 travellers - 77% - said that safety was a 'consideration' while 42% described it as a 'serious consideration' affecting their holiday intentions, according to BDRC Continental's latest Holiday Trends survey.

Fear over job security is also affecting bookings with nearly one in five people feeling it is 'very likely' or 'fairly likely' that they will lose their job in 2016.

This is an increase on the 13% that said this in 2015.

The survey findings also tie in with a decline in anticipated spend on holidays in 2016 and a narrowing of the range of holiday destinations Britons are considering (1.7 destinations on average in 2016 vs 2.8 destinations in 2015).

When questioning how safe holidaymakers felt 11 leading tourism destinations were, Holiday Trends 2016 found that Paris ranked 10th, with only 37% feeling the city is 'very safe' or 'fairly safe'.

Only Istanbul ranked lower.

The safest three cities were Edinburgh, Sydney and London with ratings of 71%, 68% and 60% respectively.

Jon Young, research director at BDRC Continental, said: "It's no surprise the issue of safety has taken on such prominence given the tragic world events in the last 12 months or so.

"To persuade risk-averse Britons to visit, overseas destinations will need to demonstrate their inherent safety and this is already happening. Tourist boards such as the Czech Republic are leading with crime and terrorism stats."