South Korea sees record tourist complaints as foreign visitor numbers surge

Tourist complaints in South Korea have hit a record high this year, data showed on Sep 6, with problems ranging from reckless taxi driving to overcharging at shopping malls.

A total of 1,753 complaints were filed nationwide between January and July this year, already surpassing the 1,744 cases reported last year, according to the data compiled by the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO).

The growing number of complaints has raised calls for South Korea to come up with measures to improve tourism services, particularly as foreign visitors have complained of excessive accommodation cancellation fees and other issues during major events, such as K-pop supergroup BTS' concerts, reports Yonhap news agency.

According to the data, the total number of complaints from foreign visitors fell during the COVID-19 pandemic but has risen steadily since 2023 and reached 1,744 last year, with the figure for this year already surpassing the annual total of 2025 in just seven months.

By region, Seoul recorded the most complaints at 665, followed by the southeastern city of Busan with 594, Incheon with 176 and the southern resort island of Jeju with 155.

Busan, which attracted some 110,000 visitors for BTS' world tour concerts in June, saw complaints more than double from 239 cases reported for all of last year.

Tourists complained most frequently about accommodations, with 500 cases involving one-sided reservation cancellations and excessive cancellation fees.

Unfriendly service and overcharging at stores came next with 376 cases, followed by poor airport and airline services with 186 cases and another 182 cases complaining of taxi drivers refusing to use meters or driving recklessly.

Foreign visitors accounted for 84.3 percent of all complaints, with Chinese nationals filing the largest number of complaints at 680, followed by Japanese at 263 and Taiwanese at 182.

Experts have called for efforts from both the government and the private sector to improve tourist satisfaction to keep the tourism boom going, as this year marked the first time the country's foreign visitor count surpassed 10 million before the end of the first half.

"As the number of tourists has grown and the tourism industry has expanded, complaints and other negative indicators have also increased," Yoon Ji-hwan, a tourism professor at Kyung Hee University, said.

Yoon also warned that negative experiences shared on social media could quickly spread and hurt the tourism industry.

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