wrote:

On Fri, 30 Mar 2012 12:03:46 +0100
"Robin" wrote:
The fact that in the office of about 40 people I work in only 1 has
taken
a holiday of longer than 10 days in the last year. None of my friends
or family have taken 2 weeks either and last year I didn't notice an
appreciable drop in commuter traffic levels in london last summer
either.

So other than first hand experience I don't have any evidence.

No risk of sampling bias then? And no contradiction between your

And 5000 people out of 60 million no doubt with loaded questions to get the
result they wanted isn't biased either?

conclusion and the ONS who reported in "Travel Trends 2010" the average
over all overseas holiday trips in 2010 was 10 nights?

Did their survey have a time cutoff or was it a simple average that
included students off on a 6 month backback around the world?



It probably included people from financial institutions who have to take
off two weeks (for me I think it was for libaility insturance reasons
but other financiual institutions just to check for fraud ) c.f.
http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Law/Question627526.html also see this
article implying two holidays were common
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/ma...acing-two-week
-break - also fits in with my experience

Also the volume of commuters will be lower in the summer due to no
school journeys,


--
Mark

In message , at
18:14:49 on Fri, 30 Mar 2012, Arthur Figgis
remarked:
On 30/03/2012 17:16, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 15:32:47 on Fri, 30
Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
The figures I saw were 20%, it wasn't clear whether that was absolute
or another 20% over and above those who would normally go abroad at
that time.

ABTA's report said:

"Escaping the crowds

Clearly we are not all sports lovers, 12% of Brits say they are
intending to go abroad specifically to avoid the Games and 9% are
looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free from Olympics fever.
The older generation appears to be the least keen on staying in the UK;
with 22% of the over 65s intending to head overseas to avoid the Games
and 18% of 55-64 year olds.

Londoners most likely to change plans

Perhaps unsurprisingly, over a quarter (28%) of Londoners are
considering changing their holiday plans due to the Olympics. Nearly 50%
say they will take time off throughout the games and 77% say they will
be staying in the Capital during the two weeks.

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research? They don't just pull
numbers out of a hat. Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

I intend to be taking my private jet to my own tropical island, but I'm
having some slight problems with an intermediate stage in this plan.

And even so, "9% are looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free
from Olympics fever." That somewhere could include London, which
wouldn't really help the transport situation...

In this context the whole of London is tarred with "Olympic Fever", as
are several other locations, like Weymouth.
--
Roland Perry

On 31/03/2012 08:36, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at
18:14:49 on Fri, 30 Mar 2012, Arthur Figgis
remarked:
On 30/03/2012 17:16, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 15:32:47 on Fri, 30
Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
The figures I saw were 20%, it wasn't clear whether that was absolute
or another 20% over and above those who would normally go abroad at
that time.

ABTA's report said:

"Escaping the crowds

Clearly we are not all sports lovers, 12% of Brits say they are
intending to go abroad specifically to avoid the Games and 9% are
looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free from Olympics fever.
The older generation appears to be the least keen on staying in the UK;
with 22% of the over 65s intending to head overseas to avoid the Games
and 18% of 55-64 year olds.

Londoners most likely to change plans

Perhaps unsurprisingly, over a quarter (28%) of Londoners are
considering changing their holiday plans due to the Olympics. Nearly 50%
say they will take time off throughout the games and 77% say they will
be staying in the Capital during the two weeks.

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research?

Depends what you mean by... I get to see an awful lot of it, and have
discussions with marketing types about whether any useful info can be
extracted from their data.

I was market researched last night. I was asked which things I would
associate with a particular politician. The options were something like
"a) making the trains run on time b) abolishing all crime c) magic beans
for every hard-working British family d) not being an evil newt-loving
terrorist-hugger who wants to squish women and children with nasty
bendybuses". I'm not sure that whatever results they will get from this
would have been accepted as entirely valid for the A-level maths course
I did.

A while back I was surveyed about drinking habits (I had to ask for more
paper). Real ale wasn't an option on the list, so the lady said "given
your age, we'll just put you down as a lager drinker".

They don't just pull numbers out of a hat.

Depends who "they" are.

At work I've had market research types be genuinely surprised when I've
mentioned that 84% of statistics are made up.

Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

Depends what the questions were, and who was asked.

I intend to be taking my private jet to my own tropical island, but
I'm having some slight problems with an intermediate stage in this plan.

And even so, "9% are looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free
from Olympics fever." That somewhere could include London, which
wouldn't really help the transport situation...

In this context the whole of London is tarred with "Olympic Fever",

In that case the numbers are clearly broken...

as
are several other locations, like Weymouth.


--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

In message , at
09:58:40 on Sat, 31 Mar 2012, Arthur Figgis
remarked:
22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

Depends what the questions were, and who was asked.

I agree, but the cite I gave (remember, there was a demand for an actual
cite) has a good indication. And it's easy to find the company who did
the research for ABTA.

I intend to be taking my private jet to my own tropical island, but
I'm having some slight problems with an intermediate stage in this plan.

And even so, "9% are looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free
from Olympics fever." That somewhere could include London, which
wouldn't really help the transport situation...

In this context the whole of London is tarred with "Olympic Fever",

In that case the numbers are clearly broken...

Or your understanding of what is meant by "Olympic fever" is broken. I
have an idea you are wrongly equating "fever" with "enthusiasm", rather
than "dread".
--
Roland Perry

On 30/03/2012 13:30, d wrote:
I'd love to think otherwise but I suspect we're in for 3 weeks of travel
chaos in London over the olympics. All that and 23 billion poorer just so
Tony Liar could massage his ego.


And will probably be awarded an Olympic Medal along with the others
involved in spending lots of our money.

On 30/03/2012 14:31, d wrote:
The real blackmail is in the holiday companies and airlines stiffing people
with exhorbitant fares during school holidays. There's no reason for them to
do it , they just do it because they can. Its naked profiteering.


Isn't it just a case of them offering lower fares during quieter periods.

Are railways profiteering by charging more during peak periods?

On 31/03/2012 08:36, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at
18:14:49 on Fri, 30 Mar 2012, Arthur Figgis
remarked:
On 30/03/2012 17:16, Roland Perry wrote:

ABTA's report said:

"Escaping the crowds

Clearly we are not all sports lovers, 12% of Brits say they are
intending to go abroad specifically to avoid the Games and 9% are
looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free from Olympics fever.
The older generation appears to be the least keen on staying in the UK;
with 22% of the over 65s intending to head overseas to avoid the Games
and 18% of 55-64 year olds.

OK, so now we can identify the report as being the one at:
http://www.abta.com/resources/news/view/464
though really it's up to you to state your source, not for us to have
to find it.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, over a quarter (28%) of Londoners are
considering changing their holiday plans due to the Olympics. Nearly 50%
say they will take time off throughout the games and 77% say they will
be staying in the Capital during the two weeks.

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research? They don't just pull
numbers out of a hat.

They might as well for some of the results they get. This seems
particularly likely if the "research" has been commissioned just
to provide an excuse for a press release and hence some free
publicity or if the questions given to the MR firm dictate what
answers are acceptable (as with the drinking survey Arthur saw not
permitting a choice of real ale).

Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

The 22% figure relates to over-65s. I doubt there are 68 million
pensioners in the UK. I might believe that a fifth of pensioners
can afford a foreign holiday but the idea that a fifth of them
across the nation will flee the country to avoid the olympics
seems ... unexpected. (For most of the country avoiding the games
is just a case of avoiding TV and press coverage.)

Of course I can't check whether my expectations are justified
as another characteristic of survey-as-free-PR is that you only
get selected statistics and can't build up a complete picture.
(So here it would be useful to see the proportion of pensioners
that take foreign holidays normally, which would provide context
for the proportion that are planning to flee the games.)

Another characteristic is the odd non-sequitur that gets thrown
in. 40% of people taking time off during the games, eh? Wouldn't
have anything to do with the games occurring during the main
holiday season, would it?


--
Graham Nye
news(a)thenyes.org.uk

In message , at 11:42:22 on Sat, 31 Mar
2012, Graham Nye remarked:
ABTA's report said:

"Escaping the crowds

Clearly we are not all sports lovers, 12% of Brits say they are
intending to go abroad specifically to avoid the Games and 9% are
looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free from Olympics fever.
The older generation appears to be the least keen on staying in the UK;
with 22% of the over 65s intending to head overseas to avoid the Games
and 18% of 55-64 year olds.

OK, so now we can identify the report as being the one at:
http://www.abta.com/resources/news/view/464
though really it's up to you to state your source, not for us to have
to find it.

As an issue of Netiquette, if everyone stated their sources, Usenet
would look like Wikipedia, and it doesn't. But where something is a
direct quote, Google will find it immediately.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, over a quarter (28%) of Londoners are
considering changing their holiday plans due to the Olympics. Nearly 50%
say they will take time off throughout the games and 77% say they will
be staying in the Capital during the two weeks.

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research? They don't just pull
numbers out of a hat.

They might as well for some of the results they get. This seems
particularly likely if the "research" has been commissioned just
to provide an excuse for a press release and hence some free
publicity or if the questions given to the MR firm dictate what
answers are acceptable (as with the drinking survey Arthur saw not
permitting a choice of real ale).

This is a typical bit of Usenet nonsense, where people are too inclined
to rubbish the efforts of other professionals, while claiming their own
activities are a tour de force that's beyond reproach from mere
amateurs.

Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

The 22% figure relates to over-65s.

Yes, a silly mistake. I should have used the "12% figure". (That's still
more than the entire population of London).

Another characteristic is the odd non-sequitur that gets thrown
in. 40% of people taking time off during the games, eh? Wouldn't
have anything to do with the games occurring during the main
holiday season, would it?

I did wonder about that myself, but would 40% of the population take a
holiday during a normal mid-August? Seems very high, looking around the
places I've worked in the past (and we know people without schoolkids
try to avoid August because of the prices).

I'm quite happy to accept that the 40% *includes* the 12% and the 9%.

And that when they say "time off" they mean "annual vacation", not rest-
days, weekends and so on.

The EU have done some statistics which say that (taking the population
aged over 15) about 57% of Brits take a holiday in any one year (2008),
with 29% exclusively going abroad, 20% exclusively staying in the UK and
8.7% doing a bit of both.

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cac...-10-010/EN/KS-
RA-10-010-EN.PDF

Of course "taking time off", and "going on a holiday" aren't the same
thing.
--
Roland Perry

MB wrote:

On 30/03/2012 14:31, d wrote:
The real blackmail is in the holiday companies and airlines stiffing people
with exhorbitant fares during school holidays. There's no reason for them to
do it , they just do it because they can. Its naked profiteering.


Isn't it just a case of them offering lower fares during quieter periods.

Are railways profiteering by charging more during peak periods?


Almost certainly, yes. The prime example is Virgin Trains' peak
services into Euston which are far from rammed full. Virgin has
chosen to charge very high unrestricted fares in order to extract a
huge income from these services even though they are far from full.
Lower unrestricted fares would mean more passengers would travel,
filling up the trains, but at a lower overall income to Virgin, which
is why they prefer the stinging, ultra-high fares.

In the USA, which we in the UK often regard as the home of unfettered
capitalism and a mostly unregulated free market, such practices as
Virgin Trains routinely operates would be regarded as evidence of
illegal profiteering and punished severely.

On 31/03/2012 12:12, Roland Perry wrote:
In , at 11:42:22 on Sat, 31 Mar
2012, Graham remarked:

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research? They don't just pull
numbers out of a hat.

They might as well for some of the results they get. This seems
particularly likely if the "research" has been commissioned just
to provide an excuse for a press release and hence some free
publicity or if the questions given to the MR firm dictate what
answers are acceptable (as with the drinking survey Arthur saw not
permitting a choice of real ale).

This is a typical bit of Usenet nonsense, where people are too inclined
to rubbish the efforts of other professionals, while claiming their own
activities are a tour de force that's beyond reproach from mere
amateurs.

As in the Titanic was built by professionals, the Ark by amateurs?

I wonder how many marketing/PR people have more than a GCSE in maths?

Even aside from that, I have been involved in checking over some market
research questions compiled by a dedicated department in a big company,
and they were useless for finding data. Some things are just amusing:
"location .... f) rest of world g) other" is a common one. Some make
interpretation difficult: asking people to rate things without saying
whether 1 or 10 is best, or even swapping part-way. We found our
customers gave our widgets a good rating for all except one factor,
where they got a bad rating from almost everyone. This was the only
question where 1 was the option to tick if you were happy, rather than 5...

Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

The 22% figure relates to over-65s.

Yes, a silly mistake. I should have used the "12% figure". (That's still
more than the entire population of London).

Another characteristic is the odd non-sequitur that gets thrown
in. 40% of people taking time off during the games, eh? Wouldn't
have anything to do with the games occurring during the main
holiday season, would it?

What is the sample - people who have booked holidays recently and so
appear on holiday firms' databases of people to be contacted?

I did wonder about that myself, but would 40% of the population take a
holiday during a normal mid-August? Seems very high, looking around the
places I've worked in the past (and we know people without schoolkids
try to avoid August because of the prices).

But might find they have to go on holiday then, as it is a quiet time so
they can be spared (eg all their French customers have vanished). Or
their holiday year runs to August, so they have to use up some odd days.


I'm quite happy to accept that the 40% *includes* the 12% and the 9%.

And that when they say "time off" they mean "annual vacation", not rest-
days, weekends and so on.

The EU have done some statistics which say that (taking the population
aged over 15) about 57% of Brits take a holiday in any one year (2008),
with 29% exclusively going abroad, 20% exclusively staying in the UK and
8.7% doing a bit of both.

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cac...-10-010/EN/KS-
RA-10-010-EN.PDF

Of course "taking time off", and "going on a holiday" aren't the same
thing.


--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK