Regulations Governing Travel Agencies Article 33

A consolidated travel agency or Class-A travel agency receiving or guiding tourists from overseas, or from Hong Kong, Macau or mainland China, shall assign or hire licensed English-language, Japanese-language, other foreign-language or Chinese- language tour guides to act as tour guides. However, this is not applicable for travel agencies that solicit the business of domestic tours from foreigners with legal residence permits, people of the Mainland Area, and residents of Hong Kong and Macao.A consolidated travel agency or Class-A travel agency receiving or guiding non- Chinese-speaking foreign tourists as referred to in the preceding paragraph may not assign or hire a Chinese-language tour guide licensed only to receive Mainland Chinese tourists to act as tour guide. However, when receiving or guiding non- Chinese-speaking, less commonly used-language foreign tourists, the travel agencies may assign or hire a Chinese-language tour guide with a rarely used-language translator accompanying the tour.Depending on the situation of the tourism market and tour guide personnel, the Tourism Administration, Ministry of Transportation and Communications will make announcements regarding the foreign less commonly used-language types and the duration for the regulations mentioned previously.A consolidated travel agency or Class-A travel agency shall strengthen the supervision and management of the tour guides it assigns or hires, and shall not allow them to engage in tour guiding business for a non-travel-service operator. When a full-time tour guide for whom the aforesaid travel agency has obtained a tour guide license leaves the said travel agency’s employment, the travel agency shall within fifteen days thereof return the tour guide license to the Tourism Administration or its appointed organization; if it fails to do so, the Tourism Administration shall publicly announce the revocation of the license.