Official Tourist Guides, also called tourist guides, local guides, city guides, interpreters, tourist information and heritage guides; they are professionals duly authorized by the competent authorities of the different places where they carry out their professional activity.
Tourist guides are considered to be their own activity if they provide information, support, orientation and / or assistance services on a regular and remunerated basis, in cultural, monumental, artistic, historical and geographical or natural (ecological) matters, to those who visit the historic-monumental, cultural and natural heritage sites that make up the Historical Heritage.
Definition of tourist guides and other guides according to the World Federation of Tourist Guides’ Associations (World Federation of Tourist Guide Associations).
In most cases they are self-employed (self-employed), although in recent years they have opted for other different ways of providing and marketing their services such as: Cooperatives, Limited Companies or even employed.
Guides are usually grouped in private associations, the so-called APIT (Acronym for Professional Association of Tourist Informers frequently used by tourist guide associations in Spain), in some cases also in Professional Associations (Since December 2005 there has been the first Official School of Tourist Guides in Europe, the Official School of Tourist Guides of the Balearic Islands). The APIT are associated in autonomous federations, in the case of Andalusia, Federación Andaluca de APIT (F. A. A. P. I. T), which in turn belongs to the Spanish Confederation of Federations and Professional Associations of Tourist Guides (C. E. F. A. P. I. T), which is a member of the Federation of European Tour Guides Associations (F. E. G) and which by
The activity of Tourism Guide has been regulated in Spain since the reign of Alfonso XIII, passing through different Regulations and regulations that have been giving shape to the current figure of the Tourism Guide, at present are the Autonomous Communities, who have all the competences in this sector and therefore are the ones that enable, control and monitor the figure of the Tourism Guide. In the rest of the European Union countries, this activity is also regulated by the different competent authorities in the areas of tourism and culture, as well as in most countries of the rest of the world.
The biggest problem of the activity is the INTRUSION, persons who without the corresponding qualification and therefore outside the Law, both from a professional and fiscal point of view, offer their services almost always at lower prices without any kind of guarantee. To avoid falling into the hands of these “pirate characters” always demand the identification of the guide, ID card, where an identification number usually appears, the languages in which you can carry out your activity as well as the field of action.