If there is one thing I have learned from running group tours, it is this: sending somebody important information does not mean they have read it.

You can put the luggage allowance in an email, highlight it in bold, mention it again in the WhatsApp group and probably tattoo it onto their forehead, and somebody will still arrive with a suitcase considerably larger than the one you told them to bring.

I say that with affection. There is a lot for people to think about before a big trip, particularly somewhere unfamiliar, and what feels obvious to me as a tour organiser may be one tiny detail among visas, vaccinations, flights, packing and the general excitement of going away.

That’s why my pre-departure communication doesn’t consist of one enormous email containing everything guests could possibly need to know. Instead, I start communicating from the moment someone books and drip-feed the information they need at the point when it is most useful.

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Don’t Wait Until the Week Before the Group Tour

My group tour bookings tend to fall into two camps: people who book eight to twelve months ahead, and people who join relatively last minute. There aren’t many in between.

For those who book early, I aim to contact them roughly once a month. Not because I need to fill their inbox, but because I would much rather give somebody one useful subject to think about than send a mammoth pre-departure document six months later and expect them to absorb all of it.

Each email has a very clear purpose and subject line.

Depending on the destination, that might include health considerations, visas, packing, money and tipping, photography or cultural considerations. For Uganda, for example, I send specific information about what to expect when gorilla trekking. On safari, photography deserves an email of its own. In West Africa, cultural considerations become particularly important.

I even throw in a slightly cheekier email linking to my Be Like Salt article about how to be a good travel buddy. After all, packing the correct adapter is useful, but so is knowing how not to drive everyone else mad when you’re travelling together!

For tour companies running multiple departures, this is where having reusable templates can be helpful. An email builder allows you to create consistent layouts and reusable sections without turning every departure into exactly the same email sequence. The structure can remain consistent while the actual advice changes according to the destination and trip.

And that last part really matters.

Make Pre-Departure Information Specific to the Trip

Generic packing lists have their place, but I find explaining why somebody needs something far more useful.

Take sunglasses on safari. It would be easy to put “sunglasses” on a packing list and leave it there. But someone who doesn’t normally wear sunglasses might decide they aren’t necessary.

Explain that safari roads can be incredibly dusty and that those sunglasses aren’t only protecting their eyes from the sun but also from clouds of dust, and suddenly there is a reason to pack them. The same applies to bringing a buff or scarf.

That’s the level of detail I want my guests to have.

The information I send therefore changes considerably depending on where we’re travelling and what we’re doing. A gorilla trek in Uganda requires completely different preparation from a safari in Tanzania, and both require different information from a tour through West Africa.

The template can be reusable. The advice shouldn’t be generic.

Cover Health Requirements Without Trying to Be Their Doctor

Health is one area where I want guests thinking about the destination well before departure.

I provide information about mandatory vaccination requirements where applicable, along with general practical advice such as drinking safe water and good hand hygiene. I also point guests towards reputable sources where they can get more detailed and current health information.

But I make something else very clear: they need to check the requirements that apply to them personally.

The same principle applies to visas and entry requirements. I can tell guests what they need to investigate, provide useful information and point them towards the appropriate sources, but passport, visa and health requirements can vary according to nationality, travel history and personal circumstances.

There is a practical reason I repeat this.

I once had a guest travelling to Tanzania with Ethiopian Airlines who hadn’t read my information about yellow fever documentation. She hadn’t brought her vaccination certificate with her.

Thankfully, she had a photo of it.

It was fine in the end, but it was a very good reminder that important information is worth repeating. Sending it once months before departure and thinking well, I told them isn’t particularly helpful when somebody is standing in an airport without the document they need.

Talk About Money Properly

“Bring some cash” isn’t enough.

Before one of my tours, I want guests to understand approximately how much money they might need, which expenses aren’t included, what optional activities are available and approximately what they cost.

I also explain whether cards are widely accepted, what they might need cash for and what the expectations are around tipping.

Tipping in particular can cause unnecessary anxiety when people aren’t familiar with the destination. Nobody wants to spend half their holiday wondering whether they are supposed to tip someone, how much is appropriate or whether they have accidentally been horribly rude.

Giving people realistic expectations before they leave removes a surprising amount of uncertainty.

Deal With Donations Before People Fill Their Suitcases

On my Africa tours, another question regularly comes up: “Is there anything I can bring to donate?”

I love that people want to help, but this needs more thought than filling spare luggage space with things from home.

Take something as simple as pencils. Unless there is a particular reason they aren’t available locally, why use your luggage allowance to transport pencils halfway around the world when you could buy them in the destination and support a local business at the same time?

We also don’t drive around handing things out randomly to people we encounter.

If there is an opportunity for guests to support a project, school or community we are visiting, I want that to be done in an organised and appropriate way. So pre-departure communication isn’t only about telling guests what they can bring. Sometimes it’s about explaining why the obvious good intention isn’t necessarily the most useful way to help.

Collect Dietary and Health Information, Then Ask Again

I collect dietary requirements and relevant health information when somebody books, but I don’t assume that information will still be complete eight months later.

A couple of weeks before departure, I personally check in with everybody again.

Has anything changed? Is there anything I need to know? Have they developed a dietary requirement since booking? Is there something they forgot to mention the first time?

It’s a simple check, but I’d much rather discover something important while I’m still at home than when we’re sitting down for our first group dinner.

Have One Place for the Really Important Information

There are a few pieces of information that I want guests to be able to find immediately:

• emergency contact details;
• the meeting point;
• local contact information;
• insurance information; and
• the itinerary.

My itineraries are available online, although one improvement I would make to my own system is actively encouraging guests to save a copy offline. Internet access isn’t guaranteed precisely when you suddenly need the address of tonight’s accommodation.

I also create a WhatsApp group for every tour. It starts before departure, becomes one of our main communication channels while we’re travelling and normally survives long after everyone has gone home.

As departure approaches, conversation in that group naturally increases. I also use it to reiterate particularly important information.

The important word there is reiterate.

WhatsApp isn’t a replacement for structured pre-departure information. It’s another opportunity to make sure the details that really matter haven’t disappeared somewhere underneath eight months of emails.

Know Exactly How Everyone Is Arriving

Behind the scenes, I keep a spreadsheet showing everyone’s arrival details.

I know their flight information, arrival times, where they’re staying and whether they’ve chosen to arrive in the destination early. That means I’m not trying to reconstruct everyone’s travel arrangements on the day the tour starts.

Guests also need to know exactly what will happen at their end.

Who is meeting them? Where? What should they do if their flight is delayed? Who is their local contact? What number should they call if something goes wrong?

By the time somebody gets off a long-haul flight, possibly jet-lagged and somewhere they’ve never visited before, I don’t want them searching through months of emails trying to work out what happens next.

Send a 14-Day Email and a 5-Day Email

However good the earlier communication has been, I still bring everything important back together as departure approaches.

I send one email around 14 days before travel and another five days before departure.

These aren’t opportunities to introduce twenty new things for guests to worry about. They’re recaps.

By this stage, guests should know what to pack, understand the money situation, have checked their entry requirements and know what the trip involves. Now I want the practical information sitting near the top of their inbox.

Who is meeting you? Where are you meeting them? What number do you need if something goes wrong? Have you got your insurance? Have you checked your documents? What are the things you absolutely cannot leave home without?

Using an email builder can make these recurring messages much easier to manage, particularly if you’re operating several tours. But I would still resist the temptation to automate the personality out of them. Guests should feel as though they are hearing from the person or team they’re about to travel with, not receiving a generic corporate reminder.

Never Assume People Have Read Something

This is probably the biggest lesson I have learned.

Tour operators spend a lot of time thinking, But I already sent that.

It doesn’t matter.

People miss emails. They skim them. They read something eight months before departure and forget it. They intend to come back to an email and don’t. They have work, children, appointments and a hundred other things happening while you’re thinking about their luggage allowance.

So if something genuinely matters, I repeat it.

That doesn’t mean bombarding guests with the same enormous document over and over again. It means sending information in manageable pieces, using clear subject lines, reiterating crucial points in WhatsApp and then bringing the essentials together immediately before departure.

The aim isn’t to eliminate every last-minute question. I’m not sure that’s humanly possible.

It’s to make people feel prepared.

By the time my guests leave home, I want them to know what they’re doing, what they need, where they’re going and who is waiting for them when they arrive. I want them to be excited about the journey rather than sitting at the airport frantically searching their inbox for an email I sent six months ago.

Because good pre-departure communication isn’t really about making life easier for the tour operator.

It’s about allowing your guests to start their trip feeling confident enough to actually enjoy it.