Soooooo, You want to be a Travel Agent

I have heard many people, asking for advice as to whether I believed that getting into the travel business was a good idea or not.  Here are my thoughts.  If I were just now starting out in this business, I believe I wouldn't unless I had a huge following of people or if I was going to actually work in a full service, large travel agency.  I am the sole bread winner in my household, but if you were in a situation with a solid income from another person, (ie: spouse or S/O), I'd say, give it a whirl.  I personally feel as though I am successful in this business, because I've been doing this for over 20 years and have built up a reputation and a decent client base.  I was also a travel agent, prior to commission cuts and the internet being a booking tool option. 

 

On the other hand, because there are SO many internet booking options, many people find that trying to find the "best" deals on the internet can be overwhelming and generally time consuming, making the need for a travel agent essential for some.  If you're  wanting to be a travel agent, to do as a part time job to supplement your families income as a hobby type of thing, I'd say go for it.  Maybe you will, in time be able to build a decent business.

 

The bottom line is, the way things are today, this industry is very difficult to try and start out at the bottom, unless you have a great agency which you can join and they are willing to train you from the ground up.  There still are some agencies like that, but chances are, you won't be in a work at home situation until you have proven that you are worthy.  I'm a corporate travel agent primarily and I love it and as I've mentioned, I've been doing this for a very long time.

 

UGH!!! GDS Help Desks

Do you ever feel like you go round and round with help desks? Why is it that we, the "just the travel agent" feels as though we need to recommend to these people how to do their job. Their lack of common sense and customer service skills, or rather lack there of, never ceases to amaze me.

So here is my issue.....the last three times that I have booked this particular Hampton Inn through my airline reservation system (Apollo/Galileo), I have only been able to confirm a smoking room type for the government rate and each and every single time I call the hotel direct to see if they can confirm a non-smoking room for my client instead, they say, "OH, (with a cheerful voice) you already have a non-smoking room confirmed!!". OK, that's great, but what a waste of time and how is this happening?

Well, obviously the hotel has not a clue, so, I call "the experts" at the GDS help desk. Ok, so the emphasis here is on "experts" which I say "tongue in cheek". The gal at the "expert GDS Help desk" tells me I need to contact "MY" help desk and my ole travel agent pea brain says, but Hampton is the one who is feeding the information to "my" help desk. The folks at "my" help desk don't set there and type the information into "my" system manually. The information which I am reading from has been "fed" into my GDS system, based on the information which was fed to us from Hampton hotels, based on the information which was fed to Hampton Hotels directly from someone in the hotel who is providing the information, soooooo, it would seem to me that the hotel should be contacted by the ones who are being fed the information, not me, the travel agent peon!! Puleez, it shouldn't take rocket science for these "help" desks to know that all they need to do is contact the hotel direct and speak with the person who "feeds" this information to the end user, which is ME and, regardless of what they say, this is not MY responsibility to have this fixed!! So, next time I make a reservation for this particular Hampton Inn, we'll see if they got it fixed!! You see, according to the hotel, they only have four smoking rooms, so why is it so difficult to input the correct information. Smoking should not even be in their vocabulary.

It's just another day in my travel agent life. I get so sick and tired of suggesting to these people how they should do their jobs. If they're really experts, I just don't understand why I have to think for them!! The pathetic part is that none of these phone calls had been outsourced which is another huge pet peeve of mine. Ah, but that's in yet a different post.

Hilton Honors Diamond and Spouse

Technically, if you are a Hilton diamond member, your spouse can not use your diamond benefits while they are travelling alone. 

NOW, like anything else in life, there are always exceptions to every rule and rules vary from hotel to hotel and from chain to chain.  So what else is new right!!!  

 

So like everything else, it always pays to check with the property direct to verify there policies, get a name and be honest with the hotel about the situation.  You don't need any silly little loop holes to get in the way of your client being turned away at the front desk.  I even advised the hotel that I was able to secure the non-members room using the diamond number and that the hotel is oversold and the front desk agent said, no problem at all.  That will be just fine.

 

Mind you, this particular situation involved a Hampton Inn in Central PA and I just knew that they would bend the rules because we have such wonderful people in the Keystone State.  *smile*  It's amazing how certain areas of the country are so predictable in regard to the way they function in life. 

I Wish the Ticket Counter would follow the rules!!!

I get so perturbed at the airline ticket counters and the airlines in general. It seems as though no one can get their stories straight as far as interpretation of the ticketing rules. They make travel agents and the reservation center agents look like total idiots sometimes. It absolutely infuriates me when I call the airline, US Airways in this particular case, wanting to change the outbound to a later departure time on a nonrefundable ticket and they advise me that "standby at the airport" only applies if you're trying to standby at the airport for an earlier flight, not later than which you were previously ticketed on. So I play by the rules and reissue the passenger for a later flight that same day and it costs him an extra 300 bucks. He gets to the airport and apparently they've now told him that he could have done a standby instead!! What I explained to him was "Why would you want to risk standby on a Friday night from DC to Providence, RI?" I wish the airlines wouldn't be so restrictive on same day, outbound flight changes. I'm guessing that if he had the option to just pay the 100.00 change fee, he might have been more receptive to it and it certainly seems alot more fair to me too. These airlines need to lighten up and get their stories straight. Sure would help if all the airlines played by the same set of rules. Greed!!! It's all about friggin' greed!!