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Travel Agents or Online Booking?
 The internet has revolutionised the travel industry, with thousands of people choosing to use their own home computer rather than book through a travel agent. This week, a Which? survey found that major tour operators were far less popular with their readers than small, independent holiday companies.
Only one in five readers said they would recommend Airtours or Thomas Cook-run JMC to a friend. And only 26% would recommend First Choice, 28% Cosmos and 34% Thomas Cook.
In contrast, 100% recommended Greek holiday specialist company Laskarina, while 92% recommended VFB which mainly deals in French holidays.
So we asked two industry specialists whether it's better to book over the internet?
We source all our holidays from the internet. It's stupid not to, really.
Three years ago, I had 20 travel agencies but I closed them all down. I realised I could do it much cheaper over the internet and then sell cheaper holidays to the customer. Everyone's a winner.
We sell pounds 25m worth of holidays a year over the internet, whereas a normal high-street travel agent probably sells pounds 1.5m worth.
So we make massive cost savings and if it's cheaper for us then it's cheaper for you.
Online the clients have all the information they require, right there in front of them. You can browse at your leisure.
You're not cramming booking a holiday into your lunch hour.
You don't have to rush but can spend all the time in the world.
You try doing that in a travel agent when there's a great big queue building up behind you.
Online you can search for a holiday in the comfort of your home 24 hours a day without being pressurised by a salesman.
If you go to a Thomson travel agent and they sell you a holiday with a Thomson operator you can't be sure that it's the best deal.
They might have sold you it just because it's a Thomson holiday.
The only way to be sure is to shop around and that's tiring and time-consuming.
Shopping around is so much easier online. You don't have to go from shop to shop, tired and footsore, but just click from page to page.
Or, better still, use a site that sources lots of tour operators to find the best deal.
If people don't find anything they like immediately, then they can try again later.
They don't have to feel guilty about wasting the travel agent's time.
Basically booking online is cheaper and less hassle.
More and more people are learning to be confident when booking online.
They are no longer frightened that the booking will just vanish into the ether because it won't.
You would have thought that travel agencies would do what we do and source all the information they require from the internet.
But some of them don't because they don't have the facilities.
So how can you be getting the best deal?
If you book online you don't always know who you're dealing with.
This is especially important with companies based outside the UK. If you are dealing with a British-based tour operator there is a fair amount of protection in place if your money goes astray, but there isn't with foreign companies
Online travel agents claim that it is cheaper to book online.
This is not necessarily true.
You should bear in mind that online companies are just travel agencies that you're contacting in a different way.
They all have access to exactly the same kind of deals - online companies don't have some secret stash of better deals.
The online travel agents don't have the same overheads as high street agents, but those savings are enough for them to make massive discounts.
And if it's ridiculously cheap, then it is probably too good to be true.
If you want to check that an online agency is an Abta agency then check for the Abta logo and number, and contact us.
We should be able to confirm that it is accredited.
The only real be benefit that I can see for booking online is the sheer convenience. But beware.
I am not saying it will go wrong, but if it does you might have a much lower chance of getting your money back.
Another thing people don't realise is that it used to be the case that anything you bought on your credit card was insured.
That meant that if you didn't get what you paid for, the credit company would refund the money.
Recently, a judge ruled that this doesn't apply with foreign companies, so if you buy a holiday from a foreign company your credit card will not protect you.
The decision is being appealed, but that is how it stands at the moment.
The best way of doing it is to find the holiday you want online and take it into a travel agent.
If they book it for you will be under the same guarantees as one of their own holidays. They will charge a small booking fee but it is worth it to be rest assured.
The bottom line is that none of this matters if nothing goes wrong, but we get lots of calls from people for whom it has.
It does happen, and if you booked online there's much less chance of getting your money back.
Source: Western Mail
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