Travel agents, how are they paid?

[anothername007]

We've used large and small independent travel agents in the past. One thing that confuses us is the pricing it's hard to see where the costs are as it's so bundled up. Can someone tell me how they make their money? Are we better off booking direct, purely from a price point of view. I appreciate the insurance they offer and promised upgrade that never seems to materialise. Do they get better deals than Joe Public with room rates? I don't mind paying for someones time, I'd just like to know how much I'm paying. I'm not asking about package holidays, but bespoke higher end. TIA

I'll be watching with interest.
We used to mainly organise our own trips, but after 2020 & the problems with separate flights & hotels, we will now only book a tailor-made package (as opposed to a package holiday) via an agent because of the protecion offered.

With the independent travel agent I use I pay the brochure price and I presume she gets paid by the operator

They get commissions from the airline, tour operator, hotel, etc.

The same way that the online flight finder firms, hotel booking firms, etc get commissions for the flights/hotel rooms you book online through them.

As a former travel agent, the following normally happens:
You buy a package holiday through a travel agent - the travel agent is just the agent selling holidays on behalf of the package holiday company (tour operator) - they (tour operator) pays the travel agent a commission for selling their holiday

If just an airline ticket most Travel agents charge a fee as airlines don’t pay commission on flights (normally a paltry £5 sector fee)

But….
Some travel agents are independent and are backed by larger consortiums - this gives them more buying power so the consortium goes to an operator (e.g. P&O cruises) & guarantees to sell x number of holidays … P&O then give that travel agent a better rate

Should you buy through a travel agent? I would say yes as you may pay slightly more than if you paid direct to an airline and hotel BUT you are getting their expertise in packaging and of anything should go wrong they will sort for you - especially if you are time poor!

Recently, I bought BA flight tickets online - I reserved them and then went to confirm them (they were really cheap!) but they wouldn’t confirm due to a computer error - 1 hr 44 mins later (on a national rate number 😞) I managed to get it sorted - I so wish I’d paid the travel agent £25 fee 😂

Imagine if you had booked your flights, hotel and car independently … you’ve caught covid so can’t travel - you have to cancel them all yourself - work out whether you can get a refund, etc whereas if you had booked through a travel agent, one call, they will sort (or as happened to my friend, the airline cancelled their return flight due to changing covid schedules so the TA got them a hotel sorted etc so they didn’t need to worry!)

If using a TA, make sure they have bonding arrangements in place (ABTA, TTA, etc) and if they are selling you a hotel and flight together, they are ATOL protected- this means if they go “under” you’ll get your money back

(Sorry for the long winded reply!)

Really helpful replies. I think when we are doing multiple destinations it's worthwhile but straightforward hotel don't think we need the middle man. We normally source our own flights through air miles anyway.

Where they do come in handy (using Trailfinders for example) is you can book a “package” of just flights and one night accommodation and this gives you slightly cheaper flights and the room is free. When we went to NZ pre covid we actually got the flights and a night in Christchurch for £250 cheaper than just booking the flights directly with the airline. We then booked all our other accommodation direct with the hotels.

The bigger companies do get paid a low salary but then extra sales commission. All tied in to bigger buying power.

If you book your flight and hotel at the same time through the same company, they count as bundled and the package travel regs automatically apply. This is why the online travel agents (Expedia et al) had to take out ATOL bonds a few years ago.

So you could book your BA flight, then go into manage my booking and add a flight or car hire, and it would turn it into a holiday. Gives you access to the BA Holidays duty office (UK based) should anything happen on your trip.

I use a travel agent for our bigger holidays and he’s a marvel. He finds flights we can’t find online, and tracks the prices so quite often he’ll call after we’ve booked and say he can save x if we slide a day, or BA have had a sale, so he’s rebooked the same and it’s now X cheaper and s9 time that he can get business class at a bargain price. He has all our details on file, knows what sort of hotels and standards we like, and is one of my favourite people. I hope he makes masses of commission from us!

Travel agents and tour operators are different things….an agent is simply the middle man and your contract is directly with the hotel. With an operator you are much more protected as your contract is with them.

I used to work for a tour operator - say the listed price for joe public to book direct was £100/night, they would charge us a rate of £80/night and we would charge you £100 so we’d make our money in the difference without any additional cost to you. With places we had amazing relationships with they may charge us £70/night and we’d charge you £90/night so I was sometimes cheaper through us.

We had travel agents who used to book our services on behalf of clients - and they would charge us a percentage of the overall gross holiday cost as commission - but sometimes this would wipe out our entire margin so we’d have to increase the prices for agents to make sure we weren’t losing money.

I would always book through a bonded tour operator not agent wherever possible.

@HermioneWeasley

I use a travel agent for our bigger holidays and he’s a marvel. He finds flights we can’t find online, and tracks the prices so quite often he’ll call after we’ve booked and say he can save x if we slide a day, or BA have had a sale, so he’s rebooked the same and it’s now X cheaper and s9 time that he can get business class at a bargain price. He has all our details on file, knows what sort of hotels and standards we like, and is one of my favourite people. I hope he makes masses of commission from us!

Same here. I did used to just use ours for bigger holidays but since she told me she can also do SC UK breaks I let her book those too. We pay the brochure price or less, find things we never would have thought of ourselves and she organises the whole thing.

@HermioneWeasley and @Hoppinggreen how did you find a decent person in the first place? Did you go through a few then stick with one? They all claim to be great. I would love to start using one as DP and I are soo rubbish at holiday planning.

I met a lady through a dog walking group and got to know her a bit and found out we had some community contacts in common.
I knew what she did but then heard she was really good and gave her a try and then never looked back
Happy to share via PM

I found ours by accident - just called dial a flight and he was brilliant so we kept going back. He’s called Wayne Bailey and I can’t recommend him enough (he’s definitely the best I’ve dealt with there). I’ve recommended him to other people and they’ve all been delighted

I wonder why hotels don't give better rates and cut out the middle man. For some simple destinations, eg. uk break with cancellation policy, there is very little point.

I see it like restaurants. Most people don’t go to a restaurant because they can’t cook. Nor do you go to save money. But sometimes it’s worth paying a little more to know it’s all being done for you.

@WhatsitWiggle

If you book your flight and hotel at the same time through the same company, they count as bundled and the package travel regs automatically apply. This is why the online travel agents (Expedia et al) had to take out ATOL bonds a few years ago.

So you could book your BA flight, then go into manage my booking and add a flight or car hire, and it would turn it into a holiday. Gives you access to the BA Holidays duty office (UK based) should anything happen on your trip.

If you add components through manage my booking it would only be considered a package in terms of protection if you did so within 24 hours of booking the flight though.

I know a travel agent who can access special rates and she receives a commission from the supplier. Independent agents are quite commission based whereas larger companies tend to pay a basic wage with commission. Both will be able to access lower rates that Joe Public on occasion but don't assume so. I work in travel and often see people who think they got a great deal until they realise there are no bags included, connections aren't practical, they have lots of separate components that are fixed when one changes etc. A good travel agent should do all the hard work for you, many however will take your money and then try to refer you to the supplier for amendments or servicing.

I'd either book direct with hotel/airline etc or use a travel agent. The OTAs charge similar or higher commissions for doing not very much (Booking.com structure their commissions so they can earn 35% during peak season, i.e. Edinburgh festival, olympics, when there's a big concert). At least using a local TA you know there's someone local earning a wage out of it and not some algorithm making a very few people somewhere abroad a lot of money.

DSIL was a travel agent for years, and very good at it - her industry contacts meant she could resolve issues quickly and she had clients coming back year after year.

I've not used a Travel Agent for years because we don't want brochure type holidays.

We used a Travel Agent when we did a big personalised trip to California years ago. It was very expensive and I had vouchers rather than booking confirmations which made me nervous.

I have generally found that i can do it myself much more cheaply plus I love the planning.

My current oven-ready Sicily trip for 4 people for a week this September is just under £3,500. That is for absolutely everything, flights, lovely accommodation, escorted trips up Etna and boat trip to Stromboli, transfers, ferry even pre flight hotel and car parking. The only extra is food.

Our last trip was to Iceland for a week in August. We spent £5,000 for everything including snorkeling, glacier walks, lava tunnel, Blue Lagoon, all food, petrol and even a jumper for DD.

I've always doubted a Travel Agent could match it.

If there are Travel Agents on here, could a TA take my planned trip and book it for me?

Or are TAs limited to hotel chains and major airlines?

My TA has worked with an itinerary for me before.
I give her an idea of what I want and she comes back with a few options, sometimes she comes back with things I never would have thought of. She also knows the ages of my DC and what we all like and sometimes sends me suggestions for my next holiday.
I also love her taking on all of the organisation, I remember being in Greece once and everyone was panicking because we hadn’t seen the Rep and nobody knew when we were due to leave or about return check in etc. I sent her a text and she said not to worry she had checked us in and a taxi would pick us up at x time, the other guests had no clue
In Cape Verde when we arrived there was a Q for visas - she had sorted ours
It’s that sort of thing that I really like and we genuinely don’t pay any more for it

I get the frustration with promised upgrades that don't materialize, but remember that it can depend on availability and other factors beyond their control. Regarding insurance, it's always good to have that extra peace of mind when traveling.
Using a travel agent can be beneficial for bespoke higher-end trips, like the Jungle Vista Hotel. They have the connections and expertise to tailor your experience to perfection. Just make sure to communicate your budget and preferences clearly, so you know what to expect cost-wise.

We've been praising travel agents for some time - I find I will look to travel agents or agencies for tips or places that may not be on the map or super popular. I really dislike places that are over run with tourist. I recently went to Costa Rica and we had an amazing time and stayed mostly away from high tourist areas like Arenal and Tamarindo. Our agent helped us find our place and I was super indebted to them for our stay at Vayu Retreat Villas One of our best stays - I would say tho for most places like this one you don't need a travel agent. You can book direct and I am sure save so money that way. 🤗

Because advertising and/or search engine optimisation is expensive and time consuming. A big percentage of people who want to go on a weekend break to, say, York will put York into Booking dot com and find something they like in 5 minutes. Of course if the rate is £150 you could phone the hotel and see if they will do the same deal for £125, but they will have an agreement with Booking not to do that and they won't want to risk it (you could be a mystery shopper).

One or two places might give you a sly 5% discount for "becoming a member of our loyalty club" when you book direct, or they might leave a bottle of prosecco or upgrade you to a better room if that's available. And if you know a place well they might say "Next time put /secret on our URL and you'll get 15% off, wink wink". But the ability of the big sites like Booking to put properties in front of eyeballs is worth a lot to their operators.

Definitely agree with you on this one. . I always look to book direct where I can and I find better rates always - or I have even contacted the hotel and have said "hey - I love your hotel. Are there any other special rates that yo can offer" a few times I got an extra 5 % off !

We always build a bespoke trip and use a TA, our last trip was just beyond anything we could have secured and, yes you pay, but her local knowledge and guidance was phenomenal.

Where did you go if you don’t mind me asking?