Recently I was having a discussion with a collegue relating to travel agents. I have worked in the hospitality business in hotels and vacations rentals for over ten years. I have come to a realization that if you choose to pay travel agents you are obviously giving a portion of your income and going to have to spend more time dealing with those particular reservations. The question then came:
With the information available on the internet, is the client getting you the travel agent or is the travel agent getting you the client?
After I thought about it, I think the client is getting us the travel agent 90% of the time. By this I mean that the client is doing their work on the internet, finding where they want to stay, and then calling their travel agent and asking them to book it. Where was the commission earned?
The reasoning behind paying a travel agent is twofold. First, if they referred you the business without the client doing any work to find you. Second, if they are a destination expert and are doing all the work for the client rather than you having to (ie telling them things to do in the area, restaurants to eat at, etc.).
What I have found of late is that the travel agents are just the middlemen 90% of the time between you and the client. The client asks the travel agent a questions.....the travel agent calls us.....we give an answer.....the travel agent calls the client. In many instances we get the travel agent and the client calling us, which then calls for double the work.
Just wanted to see if anyone else has experienced similar things and in these circumstances where are the travel agents earning their commissions.
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