Thursday, September 15, 2011

Full service vs. Self service - Makes Travel $ense

With everyone's busy schedules nowadays, it just makes sense to do things that help to free up time.  The current economy also makes it important to find the best value.

Planning a vacation is one of the activities that can take up a lot of time.  Especially when research is involved for new destinations and types of vacations.

This is where a Travel Agent/Consultant or whatever other term may be used to describe them comes in as a valuable time saving tool.  The education and day to day experience that agents have afford them the ability to offer suggestions on the type of vacation that is being considered.

We often hear "but that is the same price as the website".  Here is where the added value comes in.  Does the website personally respond to emails, answer the phone, return calls?  Will the website offer unbiased opinions and alternative suggestions?  Will the website be there after the deposit is made to answer questions?   Try getting the website to file a complaint after travel on something that may have gone wrong.

Think of it this way.  When driving down the road and the full service gas station is offering the same price as the self service station, which would you prefer?

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