Sark’s tourism committee has taken the unusual step of publishing a range of complaints from holidaymakers as it sets out its plans for the 2018 season.
Top of the list of visitor gripes are speeding tractors, unsafe road surfaces covered in manure and flies, and disorganised carriage rides that are too short and don’t give you much of a sense of the island’s beauty.
The feedback from tourists is primarily focused on transport, with many confused as to why there are no electric bicycles available for hire. There was also a recurring view that the cost of the ferry from Guernsey to Sark was too expensive.
Beyond the feedback, there were just 29 formal complaints in 2017, most of them about carriage rides not turning up on time and staff in restaurants being rude.
Overall visitor numbers by ferry from Guernsey and Jersey fell from 58,110 to 56,694 in the core tourist season.
The decline was driven by a fall of 2,091 passengers from Guernsey, while those arriving from Jersey rose by 675.
Sark’s Visitor Office also reported a rise in people popping in for assistance, up from 16,134 in the whole of 2016 to 16,664 in the nine months to the end of September 2017.
Conseiller Sandra Williams, the chairman of the Tourism Committee, said they had lots of plans for 2018.
She said: “In terms of improving the visitors’ experience whilst on Sark, we are looking at providing an informative service about the history of the island told through the history of the buildings and places of interest. The idea is to have a QR code that can be scanned on location. QR scanners are free to download to a smart phone. The code when scanned will bring up information about the island’s past, relevant to that particular building or place.”
“In terms of setting this up this will be a big undertaking particularly in terms of time. Most of the work can be undertaken by the Visitor Centre, additional IT support to navigate the process properly and materials required would have to be costed and relevant permissions gained. The idea is that with it being a simple code to scan, the impact of signage on its surrounding environment will be visually low key and minimal. It will greatly help people to learn a lot more about our island. For a small island we have a lot of history to tell.”
