Starting a travel agency in Korea?

With global travel demand and Korea's rising cultural profile, interest in starting a travel agency has grown sharply, including from foreign entrepreneurs who want to introduce Korea to their home market. Korea's Tourism Promotion Act actually defines three separate tiers, not one — and which tier you need, and how much capital it requires, depends on who your customers are. For a foreign founder, there's an added layer: before capital or an office, the biggest hurdle is having a visa status that legally allows running a business in Korea at all.

Three tiers, three capital thresholds

• 종합여행업 (general travel agency) — the broadest tier: domestic and international travel for both Korean and foreign customers, including visa-agency work (사증 발급 대행). Capital: KRW 50 million for an individual business owner, KRW 100 million for a corporation.
• 국내외여행업 (domestic + international) — Korean customers only, but covers both domestic and international travel, also including visa-agency work. Capital: KRW 30 million.
• 국내여행업 (domestic-only) — Korean customers, domestic travel only. Capital: KRW 15 million normally — but a temporary 50% reduction to KRW 7.5 million (in effect since July 1, 2024) is scheduled to end, after which the full KRW 15 million threshold applies again. If a low-capital domestic-only registration is the plan, the timing of this cutoff matters.

What this covers

• Registration for whichever tier fits your customer base — including confirming a corporation needs double the individual-owner capital for the general (종합) tier
• Office requirements — the space must be classified as 근린생활시설 or 업무시설 on the building registry (건축물대장); residential buildings and non-resident/virtual offices (비상주사무실) are explicitly disqualified, even within a shared office if it isn't a resident space
• The business plan (사업계획서) — described by caseworkers as the single most decisive document in the review, requiring a 3-year projected income statement, company overview, and a concrete travel-arrangement/referral plan
• Foreign founders' visa-status requirements — confirming which visa type permits operating a travel agency, since a student or job-seeking visa does not automatically allow it
• Post-registration compliance: registration license tax, mandatory business-guarantee insurance (영업보증보험) enrollment, and business registration with the tax office — registration isn't complete until these are filed
• Branch/additional-location registration when expanding — structured either as a registered-change under the parent company (shared capital/insurance, but one branch's violation risks a suspension across the whole company) or as a fully separate registration (isolated risk, but its own capital and insurance)
• Combined travel-and-visa-agency business structuring, since the 종합 and 국내외 tiers can also handle visa agency work

What we handle

• Confirming which of the three tiers fits your customer base and preparing the correct capital documentation (certified asset valuation or balance sheet from a tax accountant/CPA)
• Office site review to confirm the building-registry use classification and independent-space requirement
• Drafting the business plan to the standard caseworkers expect, including the 3-year projection
• Visa-status review and, where needed, the visa change filing that has to happen alongside or before the business registration for foreign founders
• Full registration filing with the local government's tourism department, plus the post-registration license tax and guarantee-insurance steps
• Branch-expansion structuring — advising on registered-change vs. separate-registration based on risk tolerance

How the process works

1. We confirm which tier, the capital requirement, office, and (for foreign founders) visa-status requirements against your specific situation.
2. We prepare the certified financial documentation, office proof, and business plan the registration requires.
3. We file the registration (statutory processing time is 7 business days once complete) and coordinate the post-registration license tax and guarantee-insurance filings, plus any required visa-status change for foreign founders.

Who typically needs this

Korean individual and corporate founders starting any of the three travel-business tiers, foreign entrepreneurs who need to resolve visa status before or alongside registration, and existing agencies expanding to a second location.

Foreign visa eligibility by status

• F-2 (residence), F-5 (permanent residence), F-6 (marriage migrant): unrestricted — same process as a Korean founder
• D-8 (corporate investment): eligible by investing KRW 100 million+ and holding 10%+ equity, either founding a new corporation or joining an existing travel agency as co-representative
• D-9 (trade management): only where the travel agency runs alongside an existing trade/manufacturing business under the same visa — reviewed case by case
• Other statuses (student, job-seeking, etc.) need a visa-status resolution before registration is possible

Common mistakes

• Assuming a corporation needs the same capital as an individual owner for the 종합여행업 tier — a corporation needs double (KRW 100 million vs. 50 million)
• Assuming a student or job-seeking visa permits operating a travel agency without a status change
• Using a non-resident/virtual office or a residential-building address that fails the building-registry use-classification requirement
• Treating the business plan as a formality — a thin or generic plan is the most common reason for a request for supplementation or rejection
• Not budgeting for the post-registration guarantee-insurance and license-tax steps, without which the registration isn't operationally complete
• Missing the domestic-tier capital reduction's end date if planning around the lower KRW 7.5 million threshold

Timeline

Statutory processing is 7 business days once the application is complete; incomplete documentation (especially a weak business plan) triggers a supplementation request that extends this. For foreign founders, any required visa-status change adds its own separate timeline before the business can legally operate.

Need the investor visa pathway instead of a general business visa? See our FDI company setup & D-8 investor visa service.