Greece Sees Rise in Revenue from Travel Receipts in January-May

Photo © Greek Travel Pages

A significant increase was recorded in the surplus of Greece’s balance of travel services for the first five months of the year, with revenue from travel receipts up by 14.4 percent, the Bank of Greece (BoG) said on Monday.

According to the released data, in January-May 2019 the surplus reached over 1.7 billion euros, up from some 1.6 billion euros in the same period of 2018.

The BoG said the development is attributed to an increase of 14.4 percent (or 364 million euros) to over 2.8 billion euros in travel receipts, which were only partly offset by travel payments, up by 25.5 percent or 236 million euros.

“The rise in travel receipts is attributed to a 15.4 percent increase in average expenditure per trip, as inbound traveller flows fell slightly, by 0.9 percent,” an announcement by the BoG said.

According to the announcement, during the first five months of the year, receipts from residents of the EU28 increased by 5.5 percent to 1.8 billion euros, while receipts from residents outside the EU28 rose by 36.1 percent to 968 million euros.

The data showed that receipts from Germany dropped by 10.3 percent to 493 million euros, while receipts from France rose by 15.6 percent to 178 million euros and receipts from the United Kingdom were up by 15.9 percent to 362 million euros.

Turning to non-EU28 countries, receipts from the United States increased by 50.7 percent to 255 million euros, while receipts from Russia fell by 6.2 percent to 37 million euros.

In May alone, travel receipts rose by 9.3 percent year-on-year and the number of inbound visitors dropped by 2.6 percent year-on-year.