Chapter 15 Developing Training Programs for Disabled Guests: An Industry Perspective

As an alternative way of tourism, disabled tourism has its own characteristics due to the fact that disabled tourists are likely to have different needs and expectations throughout their vacations at a destination. Therefore, this chapter aims to provide a generic overview of disabled tourism and identify if there would be any requirements for developing training programs and examine their contexts. The discussion of results is based on undertaking an interview survey among the executive managers of travel agencies and hotel businesses operating in a resort town of Turkey. Although the respondents emphasize the importance of training programs, unfortunately there is much less improvement in terms of facilities for disabled visitors.