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No Such Thing
ChrisCrossings · April 13, 2000

Last week's column about travel industry kickbacks provoked an angry response from travel agents, most of whom insisted that freebies don't affect their judgment. A fair number of the replies were anonymous, suggesting just how sensitive many readers are about this issue. Here are a few of the letters:

Q: I have been a travel agent, manager, and owner of an agency and am now an independent agent working with shared commission. I have never received any freebies. Did I miss the boat?

I am 60 years old now and I think I qualify to say I have never seen so much abuse of people on the lower rung of the agency staff in regards to wages. Many of the owners and outside agents at agencies I have worked for had the time for these freebies or discounted travel. The IATA list is a big joke.

Never in my life including raising three sons have I ever worked so hard, for so little. It is no wonder there is a crisis in this industry for personnel. Who wants to work for minimum and even less and have to know so much?

-- Name Withheld

A: You didn't miss the boat. I would define "freebies" as anything that goes above and beyond your normal compensation. Ever accepted a fruit basket from a cruise line? (Hey, it starts small.) A comped theater ticket from a tour operator? Ever taken a fam trip, or traveled on a reduced industry rate? Those are the perks I'm referring to, and I'll bet you've done at least one of those things.

What's wrong with that? I said it in my last column, but let me say it again: These incentives hurt your clients. Sooner or later, agents or travel managers will find themselves pursuing the kickbacks and disregarding their customer's needs.

You bring up an important point, though. Never have travel agents worked so hard for so little. It's a disgrace. But rather than chasing these fleeting bonuses at their clients' expense, shouldn't travel professionals instead be looking for ways to boost their bottom line with cold cash? If you are as good as you say you are - and I believe it - then you ought to be compensated accordingly.

Q: You bet freebies are wrong. However, I blame the owners of the corporations for not being more aware of how company money is being spent.

I did all the travel for a large corporation in Michigan for five years. The travel manager was promoted and the new gal let it be know from the beginning she expected perks.

Her daughter wanted to get married in Vegas. What could I offer? She wanted to spend a few days in New York. What could I offer? I researched and came up with very good packages, but they weren't free.

-- Terri Dunn

A: That's pathetic. Your CEO ought to be ashamed of himself - or herself - for letting that happen.

Q: Having worked in the industry for 35 plus years, I can verify that freebies existed - long ago. Nowadays, I pay the lowest price I can find - the same as I seek for my clients. You are confusing the corporate side of travel with the leisure, VFR (visiting friends and relatives) side of it. It's become increasingly difficult even for people with frequent flier miles to obtain an upgrade. Suggest you get out in the trenches and observe the travel agency business "up close and personal."

-- Marje Henkel

A: I have spent a considerable amount of time in the trenches. I did a two-year stint in the Gulag of travel journalism, as an editor at Travel Weekly. But maybe I've lost touch with reality in recent years, so I accept your invitation, Marje. Name the time and place, and I'll spend a few days with you or any travel agency that's within driving distance of Annapolis.

Q: Travel perks are a necessary part of the industry. How else can an agent learn about all the products available out there? Most of our business is in the cruise industry, and I'm much more comfortable helping my clients decide which line to choose when I've personally experienced that line's product, as well as their competition's. I couldn't possibly be expected to become an expert on more than one or two lines if I had to pay full-price.

-- Name Withheld

A: You're referring to the infamous fam trips. I've been on a few of those myself, and I know they're not a vacation - being herded around from one place to the next, meeting people, eating far too much and drinking even more.

My problem with that "perk" is that once you've been on a fam, the supplier expects you to book that trip for your clients. If you don't, there's a reasonable chance you won't be invited back next year. And complain as much as agents do about the rigorous schedule of a fam, they'd prefer to be traveling than sitting in the office. So of course, you want to make that supplier happy.

What happens when you're trying to please the airline, hotel or cruise line? You steer your clients to a given itinerary not because it's good for them, but because it's good for you. Common sense tells you that you're pointing your customer in the wrong direction, try as hard as you might to justify your position.

Q: I am a hardworking travel agent, and, yes, I've accepted freebies. There are many incentive programs out there that make it much more enticing to book with one company over another.

Does it affect what I offer my client? I don't believe so. I definitely make an effort to check out the companies that I can get benefits from booking, but I also check out those who do not, and if they are offering something better then that's what my client gets. Free trips can influence your decisions only in that it increases your confidence in the product, or not.

Regrettably there are dishonest people in our industry, although probably a lot fewer than you'd find in our government, or hospitals, and probably many churches. Please don't let a few bad apples spoil the bunch.

-- Rachel Brand

A: Travel writers face the same dilemma as you do, Rachel. We're paid very little for what we do but expected to be knowledgeable about the destinations we cover. The only way to see these places is to accept the free tickets, hotel rooms and amenities offered by suppliers. Or at least that's the line towed by the likes of the Society of American Travel Writers.

The truth is, you can say "no" and still do an effective job. It's very difficult - some would say impossible. When I travel, I always ask for the best corporate travel rate on a hotel or an airline ticket. If suppliers insist on comping me (and this has happened, although it's rare) I make sure that they're aware of my policy, which is, "don't expect anything."

As consultants, we can't get ourselves into a position of owing suppliers anything. The debt compromises our customers - whether they're my readers or your travelers.

Read the Sunday travel section in your newspaper if you don't believe me. See how all the stories, which are largely based on freebie press trips, make every destination seem like a virtual paradise. Still don't buy what I'm saying? Then pick up a copy of my old rag, Travel Weekly or Travel Agent, and read their destination stories. Not much critical journalism there. In fact, most of it reads like promotional copy.

Q: At our company our managers get all the tickets and the agents none. We do all the bookings and work and get nothing, while they do none of them and go everywhere for free. That is what I think is wrong. The whole point of getting into the travel industry is the incentive to travel with less cost. Our salaries are much lower than most positions.

-- Name Withheld

A: Consider yourself fortunate. Your managers are corrupting themselves while the agents in the trenches can honestly say they have no bias. I think that's a good thing.

But you should examine your motives behind getting into the travel business. If you did it to travel at an industry discount, you might want to consider another line of work. The benefits aren't as good as they used to be and travelers are increasingly catching on the fact that people like you aren't all that interested in being travel consultants, but in being travelers.

Q: Suppliers aren't stupid. If promotions and bonuses ("kickbacks") and advertising don't have the desired effect (increased profit), companies eventually stop using them. This is true with every successful product and service program in every industry. No one can legitimately argue otherwise, no matter what his or her present or past job has been.

What has changed in most American industries (led by but by no means restricted to the airline and travel industry) is that firms are acquiring rather inexpensive tracking software and are now beginning to calculate the cost/benefit of promotions and incentive programs. The software driving present and future targeted marketing promotions ("kickbacks") enables companies' examination and profiling of their customers' behavior pre- and post-campaign.

Using the same software, firms are able to prepare detailed models of their present customers as well as to model (and thus target) their desired customers. That means, for example, that an airline can easily determine that a deeply discounted tour to Scandinavia taken by a corporate travel manager has not led to the desired increased sales of business class seats to Stockholm. Or a hotel chain can determine that reduced rates at their all-suite division offered to leisure travel agents has led to increased future reservations.

This new and spreading information technology will lead to the end of the shotgun promotions/kickbacks of the past. Because incentives - especially targeted incentives managed by information technology - work, they will not be eliminated; rather, they will be refined.

-- Name Withheld

A: Good point. I hope you're right, because that would effectively eliminate many of these payoffs and only increase the credibility of travel professionals.

Christopher Elliott's column appears on Thursdays. All e-mailed questions to ChrisCrossings become property of Ticked.com and may be edited, condensed or republished at the site's discretion. You may reach Elliott at chris@ticked.com. Or visit his home page at http://www.elliott.org.