Singapore, 23 May 2013 – ACI HR Solutions has today released the results of its 2013 Travel and Hospitality Industry Salary Survey.

(TRAVPR.COM) SINGAPORE - May 22nd, 2013 - -  69 per cent of respondents received a pay increase in the past 12 months

-  35 per cent of respondents felt career opportunities with their present company were poor

-  66 per cent of respondents rate career progression as important or very important

-  average industry salary across Asia Pacific $65,331

Singapore, 23 May 2013 – ACI HR Solutions has today released the results of its 2013 Travel and Hospitality Industry Salary Survey.

Speaking at the official launch event held at the Pan Pacific Singapore and attended by HR and Travel & Hospitality professionals, ACI’s Founder & CEO, Andrew Chan said this year’s results showed encouraging signs for staff working in the Asia Pacific travel and hospitality sector, with 69 per cent of all respondents who participated in the survey indicating they had received a pay increase in the last 12 months.

“The continued labor crunch and skills shortage across much of the region mean that those with specialist skills continue to drive higher salary demands and compensation packages,” Mr Chan said.

However, he went on to warn that some 31 per cent received no increase to salary in 2012/13 and the majority of respondents receiving a pay rise were seen in the 1-5 per cent range.

“We saw an eventful 2012 which has left its influence on the job market and salaries across Asia Pacific coming into 2013. Whilst Asia’s economy progressed positively, the divided and modest results could be based on respondents who work for multi-national companies with headquarters in the more cautious economies of Europe and the US, and was thus not in the position to offer salary increases or only modest amounts” Mr Chan said.

While the importance of salary increases continued to dominate, Mr Chan said the importance of career development on employee satisfaction, remains high on the agenda.

A total of 66 per cent of all respondents stated that career progression was either ‘extremely important’ or ‘very important’, with just 7 per cent saying career progression was unimportant.

Interestingly, employees appear less satisfied with their current prospects than they did in previous years, with just 28 per cent of those surveyed said they believed that their current employer offered ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ opportunities for career progression, and more alarmingly, 35 per cent felt career prospects with their present employer were ‘poor’ or ‘zero’.

Mr Chan said this could be an indication that a more competitive job market is making employees feel insecure about long-term prospects within their company, or companies may be moving away from internal recruitment policies.

Launched in late March, the survey this year attracted close on 900 respondents from 10 countries across the Asia Pacific region.

These range from company CEOs, managing directors and general managers through to middle management and front line staff.

The largest proportion of respondents (52 per cent) was based in Singapore with Australia (14 per cent), China (9 per cent), Thailand (8 per cent) and Philippines (6 per cent) also providing strong samples.

Underlining Indonesia’s surging economy, average salaries from respondents grew by 118% according to the 2012/13 survey. This was followed closely by the other emerging markets of India (113%) and the Philippines (51%).  On actual highest average salaries from the survey, that belonged to Macau with (U$100,100), followed by Hong Kong (U$81,564) and Australia (U$79,371). Malaysia posted the survey’s lowest average salary (U$39,118).

“2012 saw continued economic volatility around the globe, particularly in the Eurozone. Yet international tourism managed to stay on course. The sector has shown its capacity to adjust to the changing market conditions and, although at a slightly more modest rate, is expected to continue expanding in 2013. Business confidence may appear weaker but still remains mostly positive and companies HR policies are continuing to focus on recruitment rather than retrenchment”, said Chan in closing.

For more information, please contact Andrew Chan directly on + 65 9386 4886 or via email at andrew@acihr.com

-ENDS-

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