gripe about travel agents

[njsonja]

is it just me? it seems like i have to do all the research all the time...travel agents used to do more of the legwork....and seem to be very unmotivated in my opinion...

 

but that's IMHO

 

njpetsitter@gmail.com

[wwinfl91]

The cruise lines and the airlines have both reduced enormously what they pay out in commissions to travel agents which has greatly reduced what TA's make for assisting you and me. Money talks and it will only get worse as far as cruising goes since RCI has shown Carnival they can get away with making it even harder for TA's to make any money.

 

Luckily we have the Internet to try to find out what we need and to find the lowest prices. The TA is going to go the way of other jobs that have been eliminated IMHO.

 

Have a great next cruise.

[ELOrocks17]

Speaking as a travel agent, Most of the people that call me already know what they want and sometimes get annoyed if you try to offer them alternatives. I always go out of my way to get all the info my clients require, even if it means comming in on my day off to assist one of my clients.

[cruising grammy]

I am also a travel agent and I say HERE HERE to the last post.

Sometimes, unbeknownst to those who think TA's are not working as hard, we can sometimes get better pricing than the internet. Also, with some bookings, who are you going to call if you have a problem?

We have clients that call us all the time with problems they had with internet bookings, call us on vacation and asked for our help.

Maybe, if you had an agent that works on commission only, they might not be as wiling to go 100%, but I know I do.

[10X]

Speaking as someone who only uses a travel agent, I wouldn't have it any other way.

 

The only reason my travel agent doesn't have to do any leg work is that my wife and I know what we want in a cruise. We research it thoroughly until we find what we want, then call the agent. It's not that the travel agent isn't willing to do the leg work, it's just I have made the choice to do it myself. If I decide not to do the leg work, my travel agent would be happy to do it for me.

 

The advantage of using a travel agent is that they monitor what the cruise line is currently offering, something online services fail to do. I have had an agent save me $1400 on a cruise because of careful monitoring of the various offers the cruise line posted after I had booked. As an example, an agent once saved me $700 when the cabins down the hall went on sale. I moved from a cabin amidships, to one that was forward on the same deck, and saved $700.

 

In addition, my travel agent is always there to answer my questions. I can e-mail or call and get a response because she cares about her customers. With all the help I've been given, I won't even consider using an online agency.

 

To me, my travel agent is worth her weight in gold.

[Mike11]

I agree with 10X. Personally, I enjoy doing the research. I go to my TA with what I want pretty much laid out for him. He kids me about this; says he feels bad because I do all the work.

 

What I want from my TA is his knowledge, his experience, and his ability to handle problems. If he has a better suggestion to improve my trip, he makes it; if he can get better pricing, before or after initial reservation, he gets it; if there is some problem that comes up with the resort, the cruise line, the airline, he fixes it. He does a great job, and I'll glad to have him.

[michelle49]

I'm never using a TA again. I could have paid $150 less for my trip by booking directly through Norwegian. I asked my TA to get me a quote on how much it would cost to add a daughter. She never called me back. I asked my TA to drop the insurance coverage - she never did it and never called. I asked my TA if she could get me a $150 credit becaue of the price difference - she never called me back. She told me she would notify me when my next payment was due. She never did. I almost missed my deadline. Now, I'm just hoping I get my tickets.......

[caribbean dreams]

I have one of the best TA's around, if i need a question answered and he does not know the answer it, he will find it and call my back in a matter of minutes. He is very personal and finds all the discounts he can for me, even if it means part of his commission.

When i was first looking for a TA, i did run across those that seemed like they did not care, I went to a well know travel agency once, it was me & my DH day off & a Saturday so we were dressed in jeans & tees, when we inquired about a Beaches resort package, the TA told us "you can't afford that resort" when we told her to go ahead and check the price for us, she refused to do so without a $50 deposit because he time is worth money.

We cruise twice a year and take mini vacations 6 times a year, i think we can afford beaches resort.

[10X]

michelle49,

 

You never really had a travel agent anyway. You had a money taker but not a true travel agent. I ran into a couple of those myself before finding a REAL travel agent. Now that I have one, I'm never going to leave her.

 

Denny

shoot3gun@yahoo.com (hint)

[flightiebel]

I speaking as an Agent find it funny that whenever anything goes wrong it is automatically "The Agents" fault, no matter what the problem is, schedule changes of flights, hotels overbooking even ships catching on fire. I actually become an agent after booking through one.

I have been many things, Public service, Police officer, Retail... But the hardest & most commanding job is this as an agent.

I love my clients like they are my family & they in turn treat me the same (well most anyways).. I work till late at night, go in on my days off & treat my clients the way that I would want to be treated. Just because you might have had a bad experience with an Agent do not be discourged as you did not really experience a True Agent. Think of the hard work your agent has done for you while you relax on your cruise, sure you may have done all the leg work but there is a lot of "behind the scene" work that is done while you are not there.

Spare a thought, dont be so harsh....

[critterchick]

You're going to have good, motivated TAs and you're going to have incompetent, indifferent once, just like in any line of business. We use both an online and a bricks & mortar TA for our bookings. Both have their excellent points, and we've not had any downside, although we haven't actually taken any cruises booked by the traditional TA yet. Because most of our cruises are on Royal Caribbean, neither TA can discount, but the online folks have a "frequent spender" gift catalogue that actually has some useful items, and the other one offers a bottle or wine, dinner at a specialty restaurant and other little bennies as part of the deal.

 

More importantly, both agencies are on top of things – we've gotten last-minute price drops, alerts to sailings that we might not have seen until our favorite cabin was gone, investigation of potential problems, etc. So even if the cost is the same as booking directly, we'll use a TA for the immediate future, anyway