Sometimes a Travel Agent is Best for Booking

There are times when you would be better off using a travel agent, especially for complicated trips. In this reference, think of the local retail office staffed with real people with whom you can sit down and have real conversations. The personalized service these agents can give you is often worth far more than the modest fees they charge. Here is why:

• Good Deals for Vacations. Travel agents can get anything you can get for yourself. But they also have sources the typical consumer doesn't: deals limited to computer reservation systems (CRS) that the public can't access; cruise and tour deals distributed directly to agencies or through their consortiums; and often the best consolidator airfares. In general, agents have the least leverage with airfares; the most with cruises and tours.
• Booking Savvy. Online sites are a snap for buying simple trips, but online booking of complicated trips can be tricky, and your chances of missing out on the best deals increase. On multi-stop overseas air trips, for example, a savvy travel agent knows booking tricks that can sometimes cut your costs by a lot: when to price part of your ticket in a foreign currency, finding through fares that allow no-cost stopovers and such. Similarly, an agent may well be able to cut your hotel bill by throwing in a half-day sightseeing trip and booking you as a tour package.
• Travel Counsel. Good travel agents know destinations, they know deals available from their home areas and they can draw out from clients what they really want to do.
• Efficiency. Online booking can take lots of time. It sometimes takes two or three hours to zero in on the best option for a given trip. There's a reason so many businesses use travel agencies: If you value your time, a 10-minute call to an agent will get you what you'd take hours to find.
• Help in a Pinch. When something misfires on your trip, there’s no substitute for having your travel agent working on a solution while everyone else in your predicament is waiting in line for an airline or hotel to find a fix. Serious difficulties don't hit you often, but when they do, an agent is your best ally.

You find a good travel agent the same way you find any other good professional—by word of mouth. A travel agent is a professional, just like your stockbroker, dentist or plumber, and the best way to find one is through other satisfied clients.