Not entirely true. The only travel agents engaged in 'commission kick-backs' are
are your larger corporate travel agencies. They do this in an endless game of
one-ups-manships against each other to retain corporate clients.
Ironically and unfortunately, these very same conglomerate corporate jizzbags
are the one and very same who will be exempt or insulated from airline-commission
cuts because airlines worship their corporate generated dollars. So it is the 'mom
& pop' or corner store travel agencies (the majority of agencies) that wind up
getting screwed. They are now, nor have they ever been, financially dexterous to
play the kick-back game. But they are unequivocally the ones who will suffer
greatly from salvo from the majors.
If they corporate agencies are smart...they too will see the writing on the
wall...that their number is about to be called. For as soon as the major carriers
devise a strategy to supplant the 'furtive deals' they currently have in place. The
not-too-distant future will come knocking and delivering some seriously bad news!
And deservingly so, because of their own elite status they refused to standby and
unite with their smaller and more vulnerable counterparts.
Greg
Mark Greenwood wrote:
> The reason the airlines started capping commissions is because travel agents
> were giving most of it away in the form of kickbacks to clients. The airlines
> finally woke up and realized that if we were giving it away, we obviously didn't
> need it.
>
> We have no one but ourselves to blame for commission cuts
>
> Mark
>
> Roger Chung-Wee wrote:
>
> > On Tue, 26 Mar 2002 13:31:15 -0800, you wrote:
> >
> > > Across the board and unilaterally, all travel
> > >agents in the US and Canada should completely shut down for a single week.=
> > The
> > >majors would be swamped and beleaguered in such a way that their
> > >passenger/customer satisfactory levels would would sink to abysmal and
> > >vitually irreversible depths! There's no way in a weeks time they would be
> > >able to handle such devastation. I say Canada and the US because the majo=
> > rs
> > >dare not apply this practice in lesser regulated countries around the
> > >globe...visit an airline counter in one of these countries and you'll
> > >understand why.
> >
> > The main reason for airline commission capping and cutting in certain
> > markets is tied in with where the airlines are strong. So, the US
> > carriers have axed base commissions in the US where they have their
> > bases but dare not do so abroad for fear of their limited business
> > there virtually disappearing. And just look at the UK: the dominant
> > carrier is BA, which has recently cut its payments to agents by over
> > 58 percent for UK and domestic bookings. So, the agent now gets
> > GBP2.50/USD3.56 for a one-way sector, double for a return. As it costs
> > about GBP20/USD28.50 to ticket a booking, the only way for an agent to
> > make money is to either switch-sell to another airline which pays more
> > or to charge a service fee for a BA booking.
> >
> > A lot of agents are now switch-selling away from BA, but I would think
> > that success is patchy because alternatives are not always available.
> >
> > Now, quite apart from major carriers effectively imposing a price rise
> > in their dominant markets, there is the issue that independent travel
> > advice is going to get tougher to obtain. In the days when airlines
> > paid agents the IATA-recommended rate of nine percent commission,
> > there was a chance of the public getting unbiased advice from agents.
> > The future is that agents will recommend airlines with whom they have
> > deals, or not recommend airlines who fail to pay them enough for doing
> > work on their behalf. This may not be a concern to the learned members
> > of this list, but the fact is that the vast majority of people know
> > very little of the airline business, but will find themselves steered
> > even morer in a direction which suits the airlines and agents.
> > --
> > Visit Caribbean Aviation:
> > http://www.caribbeanaviation.com/
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