Do Travel Consultants still exist?

I recently bumped into a friend whom I hadn’t seen in a while. When I told him what I was doing these days his first reply was “Does anyone still use travel consultants?”.

Now, it’s not as if I hadn’t heard this before, but it did get me thinking about it once more. And this time I thought maybe I should do a little research and then write down my thoughts.

Interestingly it doesn’t seem to be as doom and gloom as some, including my friend, may assume. A 2016 article in USA Today reported that a survey conducted by the American Society of Travel Agents of 14,000 households showed the highest number of people booked through a travel agent than in the past three years. Furthermore, research carried out by MMGY in 2015 found that 18% of travellers worked with an advisor, a 50% increase from the year before.

It’s true to say the traditional agent in a retail outlet on the high street is not as prevalent as they once were but the ones that still exist and are doing well have reinvented themselves and found a new and valuable role. For instance, greater specialisation and flexibility with agents working from home and going to their clients is now more prevalent.

So whilst the boom of the internet era, and with it the plethora of online travel sites, has had a huge impact on the travel industry and caused the demise of many travel agents, it seems there is somewhat of a return to favour of the traditional means of booking travel through a person rather than a website. From my experience this seems to come down to several key factors:

• People are increasingly busy, very busy and, quite frankly, they don’t have the time to wade through the enormous volume of information now available. They would prefer to give someone else the headache of weighing up and pricing the options while they manage their daily pressures of work and family. Time is money and it costs a lot more to do it yourself than get someone else to do it, at no extra cost.

• The sheer amount of travel content is both a blessing and a burden. Not only does it take time to decipher it, but for many people it is simply overwhelming. How do you choose the right flight or hotel when there are so many options to pick from?

• When things go wrong, and they inevitable do at some point, what do you do? We’ve all been there – there’s a major disruption to flights and you need to reschedule, the hotel is overbooked or not what it looked like on the website and you want to change, you’re in transit, your flight is delayed and the car rental company will be closed when you land. It’s a lot easier to make one call to your consultant and get them to fix it. When you do it yourself you’re on your own and waiting on hold when you’re on international roam is a very expensive exercise.

• Most people don’t have the experience and industry knowledge so there is a greater chance of making a mistake or getting yourself into trouble by not reading the fine print when you organise it yourself.

My own experience, both as a traveller and a travel professional, further reinforces these points. And whilst not everyone will want to use a travel consultant to help them with their business or leisure travel, there is no doubt that a large proportion of the population will always do so. And it seems from the research that a growing number who tried their hand at the do-it-yourself model are realising that the travel consultant does play a valuable role after all.