Travel Agents Say MoneySaving Is Immoral!

woohooman

ash333 wrote: »

why should travel be any different?

Your right, travel shouldn't be any different in that its a product which you should definately shop around for...but announcing on national TV and to an email list of a million+ people of how to play one travel agent off against another is wrong i think.

I believe that this site carries a lot of weight. Martin should be careful not to go too far down the path of anti-capitalism if I dare say that. He might actually sink a few companies due to what he says and its not going to be the people that provide a cheap and poor service that it affects but the ones who provide a decent service.

Ill give an example. This year weve just used a travel agent who were £34 per person more expensive than the cheapest price on the internet. This is because last year we turned up on our holiday to find their was a problem with the hotel. The travel agent upgraded us to a higher star hotel and refunded us £50 on our return - the holiday was awesome and the hotel better than expected. I would hate for them to feel that they had to ditch customer service like that to convert to price is everything.

The best thing with saving money on holidays is as martin said, to be prepared to fly on a range of days to any location. Then take your travel insurance, car hire etc out with seperate companies. Battering the cost down by £20 here and then going back to company A to see if they will do an extra £10 off there is a little over the top IMO, the rest is all common sense.

Imagine if Martin just announced on TV how to haggle to get Ash333 to work for the cheapest price per day! Sorry, I know thats rediculous, but he has to be a bit careful. Ide like to see a million things on moneysavingexpert.com but not holidays.

How about a list of moneysavingexpert.com approved traders such as plumbers, electricians, locksmiths, double glazers etc etc. Who sign up to the site and give transparent prices. I never hear of the holiday industry ripping people off to the tune of £1000's of pounds, yet those industries are rife with it and are never mentioned on here.

mcfisco

woohooman wrote: »

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I believe that this site carries a lot of weight. Martin should be careful not to go too far down the path of anti-capitalism if I dare say that. He might actually sink ...........................

Surely it's the exact opposite?
This is capitalism at work, albeit informed capitalism

Paul1_2

woohooman wrote: »

Ill give an example. This year weve just used a travel agent who were £34 per person more expensive than the cheapest price on the internet. This is because last year we turned up on our holiday to find their was a problem with the hotel. The travel agent upgraded us to a higher star hotel and refunded us £50 on our return - the holiday was awesome and the hotel better than expected. I would hate for them to feel that they had to ditch customer service like that to convert to price is everything.

I think the key here is informed choice: you have decided to pay £34 per person extra because of good service on the one time you had a problem. Sadly, lots of people are unable to access the net, pay higher prices and get bad service, miss-sold insurance along with high prices and surcharges.

So for me Martins campaign is about enabling everyone to make the kind of informed choices you have. Companies have nothing to fear if they are good at what they do, people will pay a premium for good service.

For me, I haven't been to a travel agent since 1998 as I don't need to pay for the service they offer and prefer the savings in my pocket.

Paul1

woohooman

informed Capitalism...hmm. If martin had said his first bit about getting a holiday down from the £1600 brochure price to £600 for instance and left it at that then yes I see no problem with that. Thats the consumer informed. and thats pretty much what I do for holidays. Its the bit after that where he advises to ring the first agent, get a price, ring another agent and get a price, see if they will beat the first agent, then ring back the first agent to see if they'll undercut the agent that undercut them. I bet 99% of the people who voted in the poll as this is acceptable wouldnt say they were happy if it happened to them in their jobs and in their sector - all that time spent on the phone to end up with a small profit isn;t sustainable if everyone did that.

Its all about smart & informed buying decisions, which hes done terribly well for nearly every piece of information ive ever read on here. All im saying is Martin needs to be a little bit careful - he doesn't have to be, its his choice. But he works in media and journalism, if we could barter for the price of newspapers and effect his salary he would hope that someone would stick up for his industry and say, hold on, you've gone a bit far here. A self employed travel agent might make £100 this week and work twice as hard - like I say moneysavingexperts email goes to a hell of a lot of people. I suppose its all well and good unless it happens to you..... I posted because I hated reading the bit in martins post where he said that a particular travel agent member of moneysavingexpert was all too happy using his site and saving money..this bit :

"I've had many past emails from travel agents complimenting the consumer-revenge bits of my broadcasting or website. I remember one who was so pleased with my “make free cash from credit cards” technique, he ‘emailed it round his agency’. Yet now it’s about travel, I’ve the horns of Beelzebub. So there’s no apology. No travel agent has to sell a holiday at an unprofitable price, it can refuse. "

I can see the difference between hitting a major bank with a loophole because it will effect 0% of the staff. The travel agencies are struggling and this will actually impact even members of this very community to an unknown extent (as people have said)

NeilW

the bit after that where he advises to ring the first agent, get a price, ring another agent and get a price, see if they will beat the first agent, then ring back the first agent to see if they'll undercut the agent that undercut them.

They can always say no.

And yes, sooner or later some will go out of business, at which point those who are left can firm the prices back up again.

That's commodity markets for you.

I'm sorry but they have no right to be in business, and nobody has a right to a job. If you don't like it, find another career.

TRAVELMAN_2

If you are booking a 'late' deal, 10 seats on an aircraft can be sold in 5 minutes.

So...by the time you've rung around....in many cases the holiday will have GONE-so you've haggled down a price for a non-existant holiday!!

Food for thought......!

Also-don't forget the ATOL/ABTA protection as well. An ATOL Agent may be slightly dearer....but you would be fully protected. Hoteliers in Majorca for example routinely overbook by 20% in peak season.....they're less likely to 'bump' customers out of the Hotel if it's a large, ATOL Agency that gives them 1000's of heads a year, than a small non-atol agent (the sort that may have less overheads & would bring their costs down as they do not have the expense of an ATOL licence) who gives them 50 pax a year....which one do you think they will bump/overbook?

So cheapest ain't always best.

Sam_Bee

As a Far East Product Manager during the Tsunami I sure as hell know my worth. As do the dozens of people that were travelling with us, and directly affected. Or the hundreds that were indirectly affected in the aftermath.

Having direct responsibility for those that were injured, whose hotels were destroyed, who wanted to get home immediately, or find another hotel when Thailand & Malaysia was running at 120% over Xmas & New Year, for all those people who were exceptionally grateful that we held sway over airlines & hotels when others couldn't access help. Being on hand 24 hours a day, and rebooking people at 3am, or providing emergency cash, or contacting families.

Just part of the service a good Travel Agent / Tour Operator can and should provide.

My personal crusade is not to save you £10 by cutting costs, moving staff to Indian Call Centres, not being contactable, or flexible, or depriving sales staff of educationals so they know the product and can match you to your ideal holiday, but to provide service, knowledge and accountability.

Trouble is, is that approach the anti-thesis of Money Saving? Sometimes I wonder.

woohooman

I dont have a career in travel. Im all for money saving expert and what it does. BUT any area where quality and honesty are ide say 1 & 2 in importantance doesn't need cheap being put to the top of the list, its a factor sure.
I hope that you do stay in business sam bee with those ethics, because if I was selling package holidays and noticed a drop of interest in service and focus moving to price, then I would ditch those ethics and go with the flow.... so I do hope the ardent money savers on this particular subject dont moan next year when if they strive for a cheap package holiday, thats exactly what they get.

Mark7799

I have no connection with the travel industry either (this year I've made all travel arrangements myself for our annual holiday because I felt I knew the ropes). I've used travel agents often in the past where I've needed advice and I've accepted there is a price to pay for that service - you're buying peace of mind.

I would agree with some of the comments on this thread and I'm started to find the advice given out about 'cheapest is best' a bit worrying. It doesn't work for everyone and I feel the potential pitfalls aren't always shouted as loudly as the moneysaving element.

....or am I worrying unnecessarily?

shirlene76

Im not going to disagree with what you have reported on, as a consumer its what we all do, however, i have worked on the high street for one of the multiples, and i also now work for one of the teletext based companies from home.

One thing you have to bare in mind is that its not the travel agents who put up the prices its the tour operators, we are the ones who have to sell them at the price the tour operator gives us or risk not making anthing at all. remember that on average what a travel agent shop makes is probably about 10-12% commission if that but only from the basic holiday cost - we get paid nothing on flight meals, transfers, airport taxes and even flight upgrades, from that you have all your over heads (boo hoo i hear you say) on average a travel agents wage is really measley, when I was an assisitant manager I was on about £11,000 that was about five years ago, and I know that it has hardly improved, yet its the travel agent that faces the battles of the holiday price wars, not the tour operator, they dont care they will get thier commision anyway, and to add insult to injury they compete with us selling thier own holidays that they expect us to sell too, for a far cheaper price.

So now I am a homebased worker, and unfortunately im on commission only, as are most of the teletext based workers, so imagine our frustration when you guys are playing us off against each other with the discount game, as i can tell you now, that discount comes from our very own pocket, remember that 10/12% commision profit i spoke of earlier, well from that commision we need to pay out credit card charges and usually hire of the equipment that we use, what we take home as a wage is usually 30% of that original commision that is left over after all deduction, remember there is no base salary here, so after a month of hagling with you wily consumers, what we have to play with is really not a lot to live from, I would be far too embarassed to tell you what my average take home pay is, as i can assure you its far below basic pay, I dont expect any sympathy from you guys at all, just thought I would put my spin on things, as im fed up with travel agents getting the blame for everything, when in reality, we're the fall guys, its the tour operators and the government who put up the charges not us. So spare a thought, for the traavel agent you may be trying to get the great price match from, who gets a little agitated if after the 4th time of frantically trying to price match your holiday, you end up booking it else where for the sake of £5,