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Overseas
to the U.S. Custom Report Background |
The
International Trade Administration (ITA), National Travel
and Tourism Office (NTTO) conducts the Survey of
International Air Travelers (SIAT). Data from the
survey are used
by both the private and public sectors. The survey
responses are an
invaluable resource for planning and marketing and can be
used to analyze behavior of specific visitor segments. A
uniquely valuable aspect of this survey is the expansion
of the results to represent a defined visitor population. |
SIAT results are expanded to represent
the volume of
overseas travelers to the United States, based on the
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) I-94 Form. This form is required for most non-U.S. resident travelers
arriving in the United States, and provides a count of
travelers from almost 220 separate countries. It is the
best source of residency data available for travelers to
the U.S.1 |
SIAT Questionnaire Content
A copy of the SIAT questionnaire can be found by clicking
here.
It contains thirty-two, multi-part questions, related to
trip characteristics and traveler demographics.
The questionnaire was specifically
designed to collect information on a traveler's complete
trip itinerary, including information on every major
destination visited, the length of stay and the type of
accommodations utilized. In addition, information on
expenses by category is collected, as well as payment
method. The level of detail collected in these questions
is not available elsewhere. |
Survey Operations
The majority of interviews are conducted in airport
boarding areas, although some international airlines voluntarily conduct the
survey in-flight. The questionnaires are designed to be
self-administered by the respondents, and are distributed
at the international flight departure gate or onboard flights departing from U.S. airports to
international destinations. Questionnaires are available
in twelve languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French,
German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese,
Russian, and Spanish. The survey is designed to
encourage responses from non-U.S. residents and U.S.
residents. Flights between the U.S. and Canada are
not surveyed. Canadian residents are excluded from
the SIAT database, but information on Canadian travel is
available from Stats Canada.
The SIAT is conducted monthly,
specific flights are selected at random, and airlines that participate in-flight receive advance listings of the
flights to be surveyed. These airlines are then sent survey
kits which contain instructions and questionnaires in the
appropriate languages. Airline personnel distribute the
questionnaire after boarding, and collect the completed
forms prior to debarkation. However, for most
airlines, data collection takes place at the airport at
the international departure gate. DHS-badged survey
personnel are responsible for distributing and
collecting the completed questionnaires in the departure
gate area. |
Survey Participation
Typically, more than
90 unique airlines participate in the survey. The
NTTO relies upon the
voluntary participation of airlines to collect data on
international travelers. While the survey data are
weighted to
represent all travelers based upon the DHS I-94 data, no
visitor volume estimates are possible where no residents of a
specific country were surveyed. This means that
if no surveys are collected for a particular market, no
weighting scheme can correct for this absence.
When reviewing the estimates developed from a subset of
the survey data, users need to carefully review the number
of respondents for each column heading, as well as the
list of participating carriers. The absence of an airline
and lower sample sizes will impact the estimates developed
for the origin and destination figures. |
1 Arrival figures by country can be found on
the NTTO website: http://travel.trade.gov |
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