Comment as:
Travel insights from Jennifer Dugan, chief family officer for Dugan’s Travels
Are You Working for Peanuts?
When developing a new agent, the hardest thing to teach is the concept of what the income is on each customer. At first, agents are so eager to take whatever they can get. An airline ticket? Great! Go ahead and charge a $15 fee. If you just entered it into a website and booked it quickly, then a quick profit of $15 is not too bad. The problem is, what if you spent hours talking to this customer? What if this customer calls you ten more times before he or she travels? What if that person has flight problems and wants to speak to you at 2:00 am? We cannot see what is in the future for each customer, but we can protect ourselves by making sure our time is not for peanuts.
It is so important to start tracking how much time you spend on each booking. This means from the initial contact whether it be phone, email or in person. You should always know how much time you have spent to earn that commission so you can break it down to an hourly rate. If you spent three hours on that air ticket customer and broke it down to $5 an hour, would you be happy with that? Now some will say yes, and some will say no. You need to know what your answer is.
How much time do you spend with each customer?
- Initial contact with customer
- Research time
- Proposal of trip time including questions
- Actual time made booking the reservation
- Presenting the confirmation and going over it to make sure there are no issues
- Follow up prior to trip with supplier and client
- After the trip follow-up
Start keeping timesheet on each customer. You can then build a more accurate picture on how much time is spent and breakdown what you were earning per hour. Do not count on your memory for this. Either start writing it down with pen and paper or start a log on your computer. There are problems and examples if you look online for time sheet by customer or project. Microsoft has a template for one you can download.
Weekly time sheet by client and project
https://templates.office.com/en-us/weekly-time-sheet-by-client-and-project-tm06088884
I know this might seem time consuming, but it is so important to decide what types of business you want to take on and how much you should charge for your time. You may decide there are certain travel requests you will just not accept like airline tickets only. It is all about how you value your time and being truthful about what your time is worth.
About the Author
You May Also Like
Confidence and Success
How do you define a confident person? Is it someone who seems comfortable standing up in front of a room full of people without showing any nervousness? What about the person who can hold their own in a debate on a controversial topic without faltering or losing their cool? Or is it the person who g
The Importance of Marketing as a Travel Advisor
In order to be successful as a travel agent, establishing and nurturing relationships is a must. These relationships extend to your clients, as well as the suppliers you deal with. As with any good relationships, communication is mandatory to keep clients apprised of changes in the travel industry,
Welcoming New Advisors into the Industry
I read a recent post on Facebook by a travel advisor who was posting pictures of her travels, saying it was her job to travel. There was a comment on the post from someone saying she wanted that job. The advisor replied, “NO YOU DON’T!” I sighed heavily, thinking, “What a terrible representation of
Finding YOUR People to Support YOUR Vision
When we first start a business, we are eager to get customers. Sometimes, that means we take on customers who we later realize are not our ideal clients. As we and our business grow, we become more discerning in accepting clients. We realize that the quality of business has more value to us than the
comments
1000 characters remaining