The Covid-19 Relief Fund for Tourism Guides who are under distress were granted R1500 per month for three months. The relief was available to those distressed individuals who are:
The Tourism Act, no. 3 of 2014 provides for Provincial Registrars to register tourist guides and keep record of such. Provincial Registrars provided the Department with lists totalling 9561 tourist guides registered in the respective provincial databases. The information was verified by the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) to ascertain the tourist guides’ employment status.
A total of 4 650 registered tourist guides were reflected as unemployed and therefore falling under freelancing category. Payments amounting R4 500 were processed in three single payments of R1 500 per tourist guide. However, the total number of the R1 500 payments that were redeemed was 11 252 while a total of 4 435 payments of R1 500 each were not redeemed.