This could be an OMNI topic, but it's a travel related experience.

In this debate, I've learned the hard way
"If you can do it yourself, do it!"

Went to my hotel in Vegas (A Motel Six with
a casino, very bleh) and they NEVER got my
reservation, even after the person at the travel agency said "Everything's all set" and
I asked that everything be charged to my AMEX
account.

So the hotel lets me stay... but at the tower's rate (double the price of the rate the travel agent promised me.)

When I get a clearer head... I will go fight
for the inital rate... or as the hotel suggested let the agency pay for the whole stay!!!

The CO air tickets had me in the back of the plane by the window when I specifically asked
for aisle seats near the front of the plane
(She didn't know what ONE PASS WAS!!!!) CO
was nice to change it.

Maybe the agency didn't understand me. Maybe
I was speaking "CAT!" CATMAN

Welcome Back Catman! I usually make my air and hotel ressies directly with the air/hotel companies. That way, if there is a screw-up, they are TOTALLY responsable and can't shift the blame off to a travel agent or other 3rd party. I also ticket my air directly from the airline. If they issued the ticket, they can't claim a travel agent used the wrong something or other. I do use a travel agent on Cruises and Package Tours, as I find that they are more knowledgeable and provide a certain amount of "clout" in this arena, if there is a problem.

Catman, Sorry to hear about your experience with the TA. I, also, have been booking my own stuff for about 6 months and guess what,
I have not had a catastrophe yet. Since the
TA's commission was cut, they have gotten really careless about things. I sincerely hope that Motel 6 "left the light on for you"
and you enjoyed looking at your cat pictures.

Catman,
Sorry to hear your about experience with travel agents. Luckily, I have found a heavenly travel agent who always makes sure I get the seats I like, enters my upgrade requests correctly, bills the right accounts for the different types of travel, books my car and hotels correctly AND does not charge me a fee when I'm booking free tickets (eg. 2 for 1 promotions). She is even taking on the task of arranging the travel of 80 registrants who will be attending a conference I'm having. What a brave soul!!

I think that trick is to find the "right" travel agent for you.

I, too, had always thought that travel agents added little value. As a result I would investigate Expedia and Travelocity, and then book directly on the airline's web site (to get the bonus miles). However, I recently had an experience which changed my outlook:

I am flying HKG to SFO for Christmas and wanted to make the trip on United to make 1K this year. The web sites (including United Connection) indicated the least expensive fare available on United was $1900 (coach). This seemed rather high, so I called a travel agent. She got me on the same United flights for $900.

i guess this is particularly true for international travel...for US domestic flights, i think booking through an agent vs booking directly with the airline doesn't make a big price difference (if any)...

but for international trips, the agents usually get deep discounts from the airlines...for example, for a ticket that i bought earlier this year, from BOS-HKG roundtrip, the price on the ticket is $1400 something, while i only had to pay the agent a little bit more than $600...i guess if you're buying the same ticket from the airline directly, you'll have to pay the price stated on the ticket to get the same fare basis...

so, sometimes i do not find the international e-fares too appealing (especially the pacific ones)...there are usually some better deals from the travel agents...even within a few days' notice...any comments ??

"grey market"-prices for UA (or LH) from Zurich (vai FRA) to the US are cheaper than what is quoted on United Connection etc, and often it offers even less restrictions (example: grey-market = only Sunday Rule, officially 8 days stay).

Before booking, I look up the grey-market-price (http://www.kuoni.ch is the biggest travel-agency with a ticket-shop online for grey-market tickets), print it out, and confrontate the airline's office with it. Till the end of september (UA closed their Zurich office by then) UA always matched that fare "secretly" (inprinted was a higher price than what I actually paid, and it made the ticket valid for international upgrades).

Since I know this I have no/little scruples anymore to try "to beat the system, to apply ff-guerilla-technics"

I book as much as I can through BA travel shops - I now this is no use to you in the US - but that way I get miles on my spend and they are part of BA, so there is only one person to blame/sort things out if they go wrong.

Until recently I had to have everything booked through the Corporate Travel department, but as they report to me I made an exception for myself with some silly excuse about lack of audit control if a department that reports me books my flights!

If you need to book flights/hotels/cars in the UK I very strongly recommend the BA travel shops, they have a great knowledge of the requirements of business travellers and will happily offer a non-BA flight if it is more suitable.

Another thing my travel agent does is keep track of seat sales. If I've purchased a ticket that becomes cheaper because of a seat sale, she calls me up and gets me a refund of the difference. She's done this several times for me and I've saved big bucks.

I was disappointed that BA closed their travel shops in teh U-S (the one on Fifth Avenue was just blocks from my job, and I've used them in the past with the nicest service. Twice I got upgraded because of room on the plane -- maybe it was the price of my ticket!)

American Express travel services has been mostly hit, a few misses, especially when I try to use Frequent Flyer rewards. I guess it
costs the agent his/her COmmission! CATMAN

I'm with TropicalFlyer. I use a travel agent (actually four of them) at IAPA and have been real happy. One did book a car for me at Atlanta when I was going to Houston (connecting in ATL) one time, but she caught the mistake and fixed it before I saw it. Anyone who's not an IAPA member and might want to join, let me know. I get miles for signing you up. They're also good on miles: 1 per dollar on tickets they sell, plus 50 per hotel or car reservation. Good on any airline.

I am also (International Airlines Passenger Assoc.) IAPA-member (as posted about 2 months ago), mainly for some hotel-discounts - sometimes for individual bookings (and miles), but their handling travel-agency in Switzerland is not the best (hotelplan owned by migros).

http://www.iapa.co.uk/

I don't recommend any of their insurances (and they mail you for signing insurances every fortnight).

If you want to become a member, give the info and mileage credit to philforest.

I use a company called All American Travel Club. It cost nothing to join. They rebate me 8% on all air tickets minus $25. This means that if you purchase a $300 or less domestic ticket, you get no rebate. Also because of the $50 maximum commission on domestic tickets, that any ticket over $600 will only net you a $25 rebate check, sent with the ticket. However, if you buy a $1000 international ticket, you will get $80 minus $25 equals $55 back. The other down side to this is you have to do all the arrangements yourself. I use EasySabre and list them as my travel provider, then call the next day to verify that they got my reservation and ask them to issue and mail the tickets with the rebate check. After I have the tickets in hand, I call Delta and get my systemwide upgrade.

JayJ

Question about IAPA and JayJ's All American
Travel Club? If you book airline tickets
through them, and make hotel reservations,
will they allow frequent flyer/hotel credit?
Assuming so.

And a followup ?: how much of a hastle do they give when trying to use airline/hotel awards. I soared on my last AMEX agent because she got flustered when I wanted to use Westin points for my Maui stay! Thanks
for your help! CATMAN

As it is the airline, the hotel, your credit card, your rental car-company etc. giving (paying) the miles, this doesn't depend on the travel-agent but on the rules of the airline/hotel etc. With UA and Swissair (and now also with LH) I know you get your miles always on paid flights (not on military and governement fares).

Some Hotels (Hilton for example) will, on consolidated rates, often only give you the minimum points (and no miles). As IAPA "just" makes the reservation (no prepaid voucher) you get in most cases credit (on prepaid-vouchers from tour-operators often not, exeption: Marriott Miles always 500 miles, even on stays with vouchers).