Originally Posted by
Proudelitist
Going to a travel service means a computer basically picks the itinerary and hotels, it does not think creatively nor does it get the most practical deals. If I need to go from X to Y, it will pick what it thinks is the cheapest flight and route me through W and Z, making the trip take 6 hours longer. and often causing additional costs due to stupidly tight connections, missed flights, and lost work time. Travel services don't care if the employee had to run through DFW for a 30 minute connection..and all for a savings sometimes of less than 10 dollars. It sees that it's 10 less and books it robotically.
The popular notion that computerized travel services book crazy itineraries with multiple connections, alternate airports, and undesirable departure times just because they're $20 cheaper than a nonstop is not true in my experience. I've used computerized systems for the past 8 years across 3 different employers, and they're easily configurable to select reasonable itineraries. In fact the one my current employer uses shows a "Most logical airfare" atop the list of search results, and it's nearly always the flight I identified as most desirable from my own searching beforehand.