MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Arrogant, ill mannered French tourists the worst in the world

Bonjour and merci absent from French tourists’ lingo

Already judged to be Europe’s worst tourists last year, the French have now been named as the worst in the world. In a survey of 4.500 international hotel owners, they are criticized for not speaking foreign languages and of being arrogant and tight with their cash.

One reason given for their poor behavior abroad is that the French are not used to traveling. Most stick to the attractions of their own country.

French tourists were praised for being almost as well dressed abroad as Italians. However, the overall message was that a polite bonjour, merci, or au revoir – spoken in the local language – would be a big improvement.

The next worst tourists were the Spanish and Greeks, said to be noisy and badly behaved.

The Japanese came out top in the survey again. They are polite and discreet, calm in the face of adversity, and they never complain. The only drawback is that they have difficulty speaking other languages.

British and Canadian tourists came second and third in the poll, which was carried out for an Internet travel agency. Germans and British share the second place in Europe. The survey compared the behavior of 27 different nationalities

The survey showed US tourists were most likely to swallow their pride and order a pizza, baguette or a paella in the local lingo. US tourists also got top marks for generosity -- as the biggest spenders and tippers -- but fell short on other counts as the least tidy, the loudest, the worst complainers, and the most badly dressed.

Timothee de Roux Expedia marketing director tried to defend French tourist arguing that 90% of them prefer to travel and go on holidays in their own country “therefore it is understandable then that they do not speak English or the local language when overseas”.

De Roux also pointed out that the French are not used to tipping because service is included in the French restaurant bills.