As bills, taxes and the looming financial crisis eat away into your holiday cash reserves... how about paying for your well-deserved break in monthly instalments?
Rather than fork out hundreds of euros before setting off on holiday, a travel agent is offering potential customers the option to stagger payments of as little as €25 monthly.
The offer, by Rocs Group, is one of the more creative packages available to holiday hunters during the Air Malta International Travel Exhibition (Amitex) fair that opened yesterday.
Many travel agencies taking part in the fair will be offering special packages, discounts and prizes to entice and encourage people to keep up their travels despite the economic scenario.
Hamilton Travels and Euro Tours, for instance, will be offering the same discounted packages they offered in previous fairs, irrespective of the crunch.
Hamilton will focus on the more affordable type of holiday such as shorter value-for-money trips.
The 16th edition of Amitex brings 36 exhibitors under one roof at the Malta Fairs and Conventions Centre in Ta' Qali and offers consumers a chance to compare prices and get a clear idea of the market's offers.
The fair was to host a group of hotels from L'Abruzzo, Italy, which, however, had to cancel participation due to the recent earthquake. In solidarity with quake victims, the exhibition space will be dedicated to a fund collection run by Caritas.
During the launch of the fair, Finance Minister Tonio Fenech congratulated Air Malta for its 35 years of achievements that helped Malta's economy. "Air Malta has withstood the test of time," he said. Noting that the national airline was not immune to the international financial crisis. In fact, on Monday, Air Malta announced that, last winter, it carried 484,418 passengers, a drop of 26,415 passengers, almost five per cent, when compared to the winter months of 2007.
Mr Fenech noted that the five per cent drop was little when one considered that 2007 was a record year and, last year, the airline had the spiralling fuel prices and the drop of the British sterling working against it. (Last year, Air Malta had to fork out an extra €30 million on fuel and lost about €10 million because of the weak sterling.)
The fair will be open this evening and tomorrow from six to 10 while on Sunday the doors will be open from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. The entrance fee is €2 for adults while children enter for free.