Bali Implements A Wisman Charge Of IDR 150 Thousand Per Person

A number of foreign tourists arrived at the international arrival area at I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport (Photo: Antara)

JAKARTA - The Bali Provincial Government has started to apply foreign tourist levies (tourists) of Rp. 150,000 per person valid at 00.00 WITA, Wednesday.

"We have prepared officers who scan around the international arrival area," said Head of the Bali Provincial Tourism Office, Cokorda Bagus Pemayun, on the sidelines of monitoring the implementation of foreign tourist levies at I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport, Badung Regency, Bali, Wednesday, quoted by Antara.

For the initial stage, his party has prepared seven mobile barcode scanners or mobile scanners shaped like cell phones, which scan proof of payment of barcode-based levies.

Officers are on standby to scan every foreign tourist who comes out through the public terminal area of international arrivals at I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport.

In that area, a foreign tourists levy service counter has also been established near the passenger service table (customer service).

There are nine officers from Bank BPD Bali as the perception bank who serve the payment of foreign tourists levies at the arrival gate and there are also officers from the Bali Provincial Tourism Office who are tasked with scanning proof of payment.

Cokorda Pemayun added that initially his party planned to place a static scanner in the area.

However, he said, based on the evaluation, it turns out that the placement of static scanning tools has the potential to create long queues that can disturb the comfort of foreign tourists.

He added that if foreign tourists who have paid levies and do not have time to scan in the international arrival area of the airport, then they can scan in hotels, travel agents and tourist attractions.

"We don't want to make additional queues so we use more elegant scans for the initial stage by mobile first," he said.

For this reason, the Bali Provincial Government has revised Governor Regulation Number 35 concerning the procedures for paying foreign tourist levies to become Governor Regulation Number 2 of 2024.

He explained that the revision contained that payments for foreign tourist levies did not have to be made at the entrance of Bali, but could be made before departure, hotel, travel agent, and tourist destination.

Foreign tourists can make levie payments, including through the Love Bali system on the lovebali.baliprov.go.id page or the Love Bali application, before arriving or at least before entering the door of foreign tourist arrivals on the Island of the Gods.

Meanwhile, the President Director of PT Bank Pembangunan Daerah (BPD) Bali I Nyoman Sudharma noted that from the trial on February 7 to February 13 at 18.00 WITA, Rp2.2 billion had been collected by 14,131 foreign tourists.

The increasing number of levies indicates interest and enthusiasm from foreign tourists to contribute to the sustainability of Bali tourism.

The foreign tourists' levies were used to finance efforts to protect Bali's culture and natural environment, including waste problems, fixing tourist attractions, infrastructure, roads and increasing tourism promotions.

The initial implementation of the foreign levy directly at Ngurah Rai Airport was also attended by the President Director of Bank BPD Bali Nyoman Sudharma, Chairman of the Association of Indonesian Tourism Industries (GIPI) Bali Ida Bagus Agung Parta Adnyana and other relevant agencies.