fraserm,

I'm a Canadian living in Sydney, so I found that it was marginally cheaper for me to book through my Canadian TA since I could use my Canadian credit card, and just be charged the IATA exchange rate. With currency exchange fees on my credit card, I saved about 2% on the whole transaction, plus with booking through my TA, I get a secondary source of assistance in case I can't get anywhere with the airlines if I need assistance. I've also know the TA since we were, like, 5 years old, so I know I'm being taken care of.