Tooting Our Horn......Part 2

We visited this topic a few months ago, but being a former coach, I've found it's always good to review. The question often comes up, “why in the world should anyone want to use a travel agent?”. One of my comebacks is “why would anyone want to use an insurance agent, or a financial adviser, or for that manner a doctor?” Of course, we in the business consider it to be a profession that requires a certain amount of education, expertise, and experience, just like the insurance agent, financial adviser, or physician.

One of the ways that our clients have discovered our value is in the shopping and pricing out a travel product. When they go to an app or website of a tour operator or on-line agency, they are getting a price quote based on the proper buttons pushed. When a travel consultant offers a price, it is the result of training, skills, and expertise in finding the RIGHT price with the RIGHT supplier, in the RIGHT destination, all carefully chosen to make their clients happy. In other words, the price that the agent quotes are the result of professional research.

Another thought here is that the average traveler who takes one, maybe two trips a year generally has no idea how a travel agent does their work. They are not aware of the time, energy and effort, resources used, or vendor relationships built up over the years to give them the best quote available based on the clients interest and needs.

Often the websites and apps locations require the full payment at the time of booking where as when booking through a travel agent, they can often offer the option of paying a deposit to hold the space. One of the things we can't do is control the actions of the travel supplier; airline, cruise line, tour operator, car rental company, or hotel. We just hope that they treat our clients the way we would treat them. When that doesn't happen, of course we want to know it. Generally we have no control over being able to resolve an issue, but the point is that we try; we get involved in trying to make things right to the satisfaction of our client. You can't go to the app or website for that kind of service!!

An additional consideration is that any cheap gadget can book a cruise or tour, but only a human can care that it's the right cruise or tour for you or your family. I certainly don't want to take anything away from the supplier's websites, for they are excellent sources of information. In fact they often are more current than some of the agents who work for them. For example I made reservations for some clients to go to Alaska with me one day and I asked the agent helping me if there were any promotions that we could offer the client. She informed me that she didn't think there would be any because their Alaska ships for next year were filling up fast. Well, that client called me the next day to let me know that the website was showing an attractive promotion for the trip they were on. So, I called the cruise line and sure enough, they had rolled out the promotion that day, and she asked “would I be interested in rolling the clients over into that promotion?”. By all means!! In the course of the day, we would have discovered the promotion, but were so happy that we could get the clients what they wanted.

That's the day in the life of a professional travel agent. The elements of travel are changing all the time but with experience we've learned to be flexible, and in the opinion of many of our clients, a necessary profession. Thank goodness!!

Give the experienced agents at The Travel Factory a call today at 698-1421 or toll-free 800-760-4040, or drop by to visit a real person interested in your travel needs at 4150 Southwest Drive.