MIQ’s 12th voucher release: 838 rooms not taken – 16 Dec 2021
Published: 16 December 2021
At 11am today, the 12th release of rooms through the virtual lobby took place.
On this page
Statement by Joint Head of MIQ Chris Bunny
Once again we saw a drop in the number of people participating in today’s room release. There were only 2,997 people in the lobby at 11am – approximately 1,000 less people than last week. This has been a consistent trend since the border re-opening announcement. For a 4th time, everybody that joined the queue had the opportunity to enter the Managed Isolation Allocation System website.
After 1.5 hours, there was no one left in the queue and there were still 1,000 rooms remaining. The room release remained open until 3.10pm, making it the longest room release we have had since the lobby was introduced. The room release ended after 4 hours 10 minutes with 838 rooms still left for December and March dates.
Today was the first room release with a new process for travellers to pre-verify their travel documents (passports and visas) before booking a room. This new process was introduced to make sure all travellers are eligible to enter New Zealand before booking a room. More passengers were verified ahead of the room release than took part in it – approximately 6,500 passengers were verified ahead of time, and only 5,762 passengers took part in the room release.
More than 58,700 people have secured vouchers through the last 12 room releases (including today’s) and there are still several thousand rooms to be released through to March.
Summary of the stats
The lobby opened about 10 minutes before 10am today.
At 11am 2,997 people were moved into the queue – this represented 4,601 passengers. These numbers grew as people entered the queue throughout the room release (these people go to the back of the queue). There were 3,852 people in the queue in total, representing 5,762 passengers.
2,464 people took the opportunity to secure MIQ vouchers – this represented 3,721 passengers from 109 countries, and across 2,506 rooms. The number of available rooms was 3,344 but not all rooms were taken.
All 3,852 people got access to the website and had the chance to book a room, but some chose not to, either because they didn’t want a particular month (e.g. March) or the dates that were left didn’t line up with flight routes from their departure point.
Dates for today’s release were available across December, January, February and March. January and February dates were the most popular. The room release finished with 838 rooms left for December and March (457 for December and 381 for March).
Approximately 40% of people who participated in the room release today were based in New Zealand. This could be people booking on behalf of other people based overseas, or could be people planning to travel overseas for business, to see family etc and return to New Zealand.
The next room release is to be confirmed.
We have already brought more than 200,000 people back to New Zealand safely and will continue to focus on the safe return of more Kiwis.
Rooms released today
December – 999 (not all taken)
January – 983
February – 570
March – 792 (not all taken)
Top countries (by departure point)
Note: This is people not rooms:
Australia – 922 passengers
India – 458 passengers
Great Britain – 402 passengers
USA – 360 passengers
China – 122 passengers
Fiji – 96 passengers
United Arab Emirates — 90 passengers
Canada – 86 passengers
Pakistan – 86 passengers
Hong Kong – 83 passengers
| Room release 12 – 16 Dec | Room release 11 – 7 Dec | Room release 10 – 30 Nov | Room release 9 – 25 Nov | Room release 8 – 18 Nov | Room release 7 – 9 Nov | Room release 6 – 2 Nov | Room release 5 – 21 Oct | Room release 4 – 12 Oct | Room release 3 – 5 Oct | Room release 2 – 28 Sept | Room release 1 – 20 Sept | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| People in lobby | 2,997 representing 4,601 passengers1 | 4,023 – representing 6,131 passengers1 | 4,498 – representing 6,909 passengers1 | 5,426 –representing 8,182 passengers1 | 14,599 – representing 22,406 passengers1 | 14,205 – representing 22,458 passengers1 | 15,925 | 19,823 | 22,459 | 25,100 | 26,700 | 25,000 |
| Total people in queue | 3,852 representing 5,762 passengers1 | 4,710 – representing 7,092 passengers1 | 5,315 – representing 8,037 passengers1 | 6,307 – representing 9,341 passengers1 | 16,278 – representing 24,675 passengers1 | 16,277 – representing 24,695 passengers1 | 17,665 – representing 26,580 passengers1 | 21,368 | 24,987 | 28,406 | 31,319 | 31,900 |
| Total people who got vouchers | 3,721 | 3,852 | 3,153 | 4,927 | 6,214 | 5,888 | 5,483 | 3,516 | 5,015 | 6,449 | 6,231 | 5,364 |
| Total number of countries | 109 | 104 | 95 | 122 | 126 | 128 | 109 | 97 | 111 | 126 | 125 | 117 |
| Total Number of rooms | 3,344 available; 2,506 taken | 2,506 | 2,090 | 3,411 available; 3,320 taken | 4,230 | 4,039 | 3,747 | 2,103 | 2,927 | 3,739 | 3,718 | 3,205 |
| Room numbers by month | December – 999 (not all taken) January – 983 February – 570 March – 792 (not all taken) |
December – 699 January – 329 February – 998 March – 480 |
December – 366 January – 459 February – 515 March – 750 |
November – 357 December – 988 January – 850 February – 1,216 (not all taken) |
November – 659 December – 1,235 January – 1,146 February – 1,190 |
November – 507 December – 1,337 January – 1,035 February – 1,160 |
December – 1,103 January – 1,144 February – 1,500 |
December – 1,000 January – 1,103 |
November – 159 December – 1,197 January – 1,571 |
October – 316 November –1,501 December – 1,201 January – 721 |
October – 1,434 November –1,600 December – 684 |
September – 338 October – 1767 November – 600 December – 500 |
| Top Countries (by passenger) |
Australia – 922 India – 458 Great Britain – 402 USA – 360 China – 122 |
India – 751 Australia – 610 USA – 388 Great Britain – 380 China – 149 |
Australia – 527 India – 524 Great Britain – 386 USA – 316 United Arab Emirates – 127 |
Australia – 1175 India – 599 USA – 505 Great Britain – 481 China – 213 |
Australia – 1707 Great Britain – 755 India – 668 USA –625 China – 261 |
Australia – 1399 Great Britain – 779 USA – 633 India – 607 China – 274 |
Australia – 1258 Great Britain – 747 India – 589 USA – 581 China – 235 |
Australia– 714 Great Britain – 424 USA – 423 India – 400 China – 180 |
Australia – 986 Great Britain – 773 USA –541 India– 475 United Arab Emirates – 211 |
Australia – 1296 Great Britain &ndash 970 USA – 722 India – 583 China– 272 |
Australia – 1629 Great Britain– 791 India – 647 USA – 495 China – 263 |
Australia –1352 Great Britain –774 India –460 USA – 453 China –268 |
1 Footnote: This data differs from previous releases due to the change in passport entry requirements for the lobby. People are now required to enter the passport numbers of all passengers travelling in their group, and only 1 member of the group can enter the lobby.
https://www.miq.govt.nz/about/news/miqs-12th-voucher-release-838-rooms-not-taken-16-dec-2021/
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