The objectives of the project were to: (a) Offer a better understanding of the requirements of tourists with hearing impairments as a valuable share of the tourism market (referring to physical access, accommodation, food, activities, attractions and transport). (b) Create employment opportunities for deaf and hard of hearing people to work as tourist agents creating accessible vacations for their peers. (c) Train travel agents in how to serve deaf customers and customers with hearing impairments. Staff who are well-trained with a ‘can-do’ attitude are important in improving travel enjoyment for these groups of customers. (d) Create a European community of deaf and hard of hearing people that will be advising peers to organise their trips in the visiting country.
Accessible tourism is a market of growing significance. However the tourism sector is still failing to serve the needs of people with disabilities. Only 9% of touristic services provide accessible offers . One of the most important barriers is staff knowledge and information. In particular managers of companies and suppliers of tourist services have a significant ignorance of many aspects related to the accessibility of their establishments and services. Of all the disabilities and impairments, hearing loss is currently the most widespread. The World Health Organization estimates (2020) that over 5% of the world’s population – or 466 million people – has disabling hearing loss. The goals of the FEELIT project were: (a) to train deaf people and people with hearing impairments on the basic tasks and skills of travel agents, in order to work as travel agents offering high quality and authentic tourism packages and experiences for their peers, and (b) to train existing travel agents and tourist operators in the designing accessible tourist packages for deaf and hard of hearing people.