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Who's a Travel Agent?
By James Shillinglaw
Published on: September 3, 2008
How can suppliers and consumers recognize legitimate travel agents? That’s a question that has dominated the industry ever since I started covering it 18 years ago. The growth of large multi-level organizations enlisting thousands of outside “agents” to sell travel or just memberships in the groups they represent has confused the issue even further. Consumers are left wondering just what a travel agent really is when their neighbor down the street, who has no obvious qualifications, starts offering them cruise deals. One solution, of course, is to tighten the requirements for travel agent identification offered by a number of industry groups. And that’s just what my panel at THETRADESHOW will attempt to tackle on Sept. 8 in Orlando at 11:30 p.m. on the SHOWSTAGE on the tradeshow floor.
At one point back in the late 1990s, I thought those “card mills” had finally been vanquished. But we unfortunately have seen a new surge of them as multi-level marketers “rediscover” the lure of the travel industry. The benefits of cut-rate travel are far too enticing for these companies, who purport to offer discounts and the ability for consumers to “travel like a travel agent.” Multi-level marketing companies are not in themselves illegal, but they end up confusing consumers, many of whom already mistakenly believe they can get the best “deal” by booking online. Now their neighbor down the street is offering them the best “deal” as well as the chance to get in on the action.
One solution to this problem is to firm up the system of travel agent numeric identification or ID cards that identify legitimate travel agents to travel suppliers. These numeric codes let suppliers know which agents are professional sellers of travel. During our panel, titled “Will the Real Travel Professional Stand Up?” we’ll discuss some of the major numeric coding systems in the market today, as well as certain ID cards. Our panelists include, at press time: Bob Sharak, executive vice president-marketing and distribution for CLIA; Scott Koepf, CTC, MCC, president of NACTA; Gary Fee, president and founder of OSSN; Bert Rivero, regional director-the Americas for IATAN; and John Pittman, vice president-industry and consumer affairs for ASTA.
I’m still hoping for more panelists to join us, but sadly it appears that ARC, which has its own travel agent identification systems, will not be among them. For the first time in my memory, ARC is not participating in an ASTA-based event (THETRADESHOW is sponsored by ASTA and other travel industry organizations). I was told by ARC that it would not participate due to budgetary considerations.
I also have reached out to ARTA, which is supporting the development of a completely new agent ID, though scheduling considerations may prevent someone from joining us on Monday. Now, to be honest, I’m not convinced that another form of agent identification is really necessary. And TRIP, the ARTA-backed ID system, still seems many years away, if it indeed does come to fruition at all. But I’m willing to be convinced -- and this forum could be a place to start.
During our session, I’ll ask each of our panelists to describe their agent identification or ID systems, including how many agents participate, what the requirements and cost are, and what benefits they provide to agents. Then we’ll get into the real issues involving agent identification. One question I’ll pose whether it really is useful to have so many different agent identification systems. We’ll also tackle the issue of whether card mills can be minimized by systems that can identify legitimate professional travel agents.
We’ll examine how suppliers and some of these agent identification systems themselves are dealing with the issue of “card mills” – namely by dropping those companies that seem to fit the “card mill” mold. I’ll also be asking how these travel agent identification systems are working with travel suppliers to help them better identify travel professionals. The entire session is aimed at answering a pretty basic question: Are the current systems of travel agent identification adequate? And if not, how could they be improved?
So I hope you’ll join us at THETRADESHOW at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 8 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, whether you are already attending or still thinking of going to the show. There is much, much more for you to experience at THETRADESHOW – both suppliers and agents – and there’s still time to register for the show. Please visit www.thetradeshow.org for more information.
James Shillinglaw
Editor in Chief
jshillinglaw@pmgemail.com
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