Much has changed in the travel industry since Jared Buker started his career more than 20 years ago.
One of the most important has, of course, been technology. Back when Buker began his career, he remembers working with AAA and creating TripTiks by hand. When he needed to look up an AAA membership, he used microfiche, a flat piece of film.
He also remembers when boarding passes were printed and he would deliver them to clients.
"I remember every time there was a fare war, each agent would go through all of their flight reservations and reissue tickets-sometimes many tickets-at the lower fare," said Buker. "Back at that time, the change fees were about $75, so even with the fee, our clients would still receive a voucher, or MCO, for the fare difference that us agents would hold onto for their future bookings. It was actually a lot of work."
Alex Dalton, an affiliate of Travel Experts, has been in the travel industry for 17 years and said that technology has made some of the changes in the industry more manageable:
"How we conduct business has changed as well, with many of the GDS systems going to a more Internet-based system than their old platforms. This requires constant training, but it seems that many of the new features perform without the same [lack] of reliability as the older ones."
He added that the changes in the industry over the years have been dramatic: "I've watched the airlines consolidate to, what I feel is, the detriment of the consumer, to amass market share and push through anti-passenger policies."
On the flipside, Dalton said that some airlines were on the verge of insolvency and had to merge to survive. However, airlines have taken back most of the domestic commissions they used to offer agents.
"I'd love to see domestic commissions come back into play for travel agents. I would also appreciate the larger conglomerate hotel chains return to working with travel agents on a less stringent level when it comes to rates. 'Management won't approve that' seems to be the standard reply these days."
One major change that Buker has come to appreciate is the fact that his clients are savvy and use the internet: "Our clients know what they want these days, but when they don't know what they want or if what they want is something that I know they won't like, I am luckily still around to save the day."
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