To use a Travel Agent, or to not use a Travel Agent, that is the question...

We always use a travel agent. They can get the same (or often better) deals than you get online. Not to mention,if there are any problems with your flight,they can help you out. If you don't already use a TA,ask friends for a recommendation.

Travel agents live and work in our communities. They pay taxes. They deserve to make a living. JMO

Use a travel agent? If you like. I don't and haven't for many years as my experience is that most haven't traveled much so their knowledge base is quite limited. Are there truly savings to be had booking through a travel agent? I think not and the system changed dramatically over the years. My impression is the few remaining travel agents around here sell mostly to "mature" travelers unwilling or unable to perform a bit of research, focusing on cruises and group tours. To be fair, I am willing to spend much time searching for flights, etc. that makes it uneconomic for a travel agent. Also, are travel agents objective in their efforts or receive various inducements to use certain firms? You can find much valuable information published by Rick Steves and very helpful Travel Forum folks that offer high quality suggestions. Ask away.

Why do you think TA's can get better pricing on overseas flights than you can yourself? You say you like the planning and work - you'll be more apt to plan what you enjoy if you do it yourself. The TA is in it for commission - YOU, on the other hand, have a vested interest to look out for your own fun, safety, costs, etc.

The only time I might use a travel agent in person is for a complicated cruise itinerary (or just didn't want to bother, but I'm not there yet.) The days when agents, especially small, local operations, had access to cheaper fares are mostly history. One indicator is that the client now pays a fee for the service since airlines cut back commissions. An exception is the big on-line agencies which fairly often have cheaper hotel prices that the official hotel rates. They can't beat the direct airline sales, but they do book itineraries involving more than one airplane when the carriers don't sell each other's tickets. Most dealings with Expedia, Booking.com or the rest is done via Internet anyhow. As for seats at the front of the plane, telephone the airline itself. Ditto for points travel which, on complicated itineraries, may be easier planned with an airline rep.

Bruce, don't use a TA thinking it will save you money- do it if you think the extra help is worth it. I sometimes use a TA for anything more complicated than a straight forward trip. For example, trying to coordinate flights for 6 people from different cities. They can see more connection options than I can, and sometimes get seat assignments when the airline's site won't. My TA will check in for us, and will help when there is a glitch, like a flight cancellation, when we are overseas. Another lifeline to someone who has our critical ID information. But we have to pay a fee for this service, since, as was mentioned, they don't get kickbacks from airlines anymore.
The hard part is finding a TA that actually knows a lot about travel to, and especially in, Europe.

Ive heard of people making DIY mistakes, such as booking Grenada instead of Granada, or not knowing about open jaw ticketing, but you sound like you know what you're doing.

A good TA is worth his / her weight in gold for certain types of trips. A bad one isn't worth $^#&! Some are very knowledgeable about European travel while others know next to nothing and just operate off brochures. The only way to get a good, knowledgeable one is ask personal friends who've used TAs in your area and then go talk to them. "Interview" them as if they were applying for a job and then go with your gut feeling. A good, conscientious one is worth the small amount extra it may cost just to have someone else handle a lot of the details. Then too, if there is a snag you've got someone in your corner to advocate for you. On the other hand, one who is just going through the motions is to be avoided. Be sure to know what the policy is regarding cancellation fees is something should happen and you can't make the trip. Some agencies have very reasonable policies while others will try to take you to the cleaners. We've done a lot of our own planning and have also used an agent years for certain type trips.

Congratulations on your upcoming retirement. When my husband and I retired three years ago, the fist thing we did was head to Europe for six weeks. We flew Business Class with our miles, but that was not new---we always fly that way as I have learned how to earn and use the miles ( and because it is British Airways the flights are not free---we fly in Business Class for about the cost of an economy ticket).

It seems your question about travel agents is mostly based on your "understanding" that they can get better prices on Business Class flights. How did you come by this understanding? I do not know if it is true or not, but I am slightly skeptical. You could test this out by simply contacting one and asking. First shop flights for your proposed dates on the airline websites so you have an idea what they cost. You might include Open Skies in your search if you are going to London or Paris (from JFK) as they often have sales. This is an affiliate of British Airways that started out as an "all business" airline, but they may now offer other classes of service. We have not flown them as the regular BA flights from Seattle meet our needs best.

So compare flight prices you find with what a travel agent offers, and decide if they can be helpful.

my understanding is that purchasing overseas flights through a travel agent is often less expensive than doing it yourself - especially for Business class.

I don't think there is any evidence out there to support this claim (except maybe from the travel agent industry). A travel agent has access to the same airline online reservation systems that you do, no matter if you're traveling coach or business class.

I think this comes down to assessing the value of your time, your comfort with technology, breadth (or lack) of enthusiasm for doing the research yourself, and prior experience (you tend to get really good at doing things if you do them yourself). The services of a travel agent would not have any value for me personally, but everyone is different. People often assume that only an agent can do some task for them, no matter how straightforward (booking a simple flight or ticket). If you do use one, I would focus on only highly complicated or specialized tasks so that you get your money's worth.

And beware of websites that purport to offer really low prices on Business Class seats on multiple airlines--- they may be "miles brokers" selling seats they bought using other parties' miles. This violates the Terms and Conditions of most airline mileage programs.

Our TA will monitor and notify us of any change in flight schedules and make changes if we ask for it. A post was just made about flight cancellations Cancellationfrom Beth. Her situation is the kind of situation in which a good travel agent can help. We had that happen and the TA managed to re-book with reasonable connections, etc. She tracked things during an airline strike and let us know the situation with our flight. Probably won't happen to you, but there it is.

The flight cancellation example is one of those tasks you can easily do yourself. I don't know why folks think you need a travel agent for something like this (I see it as a routine issue that's happened to me multiple times). You're going to end up searching for an alternative flight online anyway and feeding that info to an agent - why not just bypass the agent altogether and call the airline yourself with all the flight info in front of you? It's faster and more straightforward and decreases the potential of any errors. The airline doesn't respond any differently to a travel agent than a person whose flight was changed. I think this may be a generational/perception difference but I wouldn't think of involving a third party if I can deal with a vendor/airline myself.

Will this be an around-the-world or multi-continent trip? Perhaps a few people here have experience with those specifics.

Early in my European travel I made flight reservations, then wondered if they were the cheapest, so I called a travel agent. She found the exact same flights as I did, but for more when you added in her fee.

As for accommodations and transportation, travel agents are only going to book something for you that pays them a commission, and the most economical places don't.

I know of a woman who once worked as a travel agent for an agency where you just paid an annual flat fee, and they made travel arrangements for you without a fee per item. I've never asked her if she knows how to use town websites for Germany or how to get Savings Fare tickets and regional passes on German Rail.

What percentage of the Travel Forum posters use travel agents these days to book European trips? As for flights, I like to decide which connecting cities/airports, layovers, etc. are acceptable to me. There are many variables and it's simply not worth a travel agent's time to check the many possibilities that I will routinely perform. Will a travel agent search alternate routings that may be more to much more economical? Same for accommodations...a city center two star hotel or a B&B near public transportation may be perfect for me but unknown to a travel agent. A travel agent may just select name brand business class hotels regardless of location, costs, etc. Are there incentives for travel agents to swing business in certain directions? Anyway, please report back with your decision and results.

Agnes, sure you can do all this yourself. Not so fun if you're on a cell-phone in Frankfurt in the middle of the night with no computer access. Like any service, sometimes its worth the extra cost for some extra help. Not for everyone in every circumstance, I agree. A TA does not need to be a substitute for your own research.

As for changed flights, notices are sent to me automatically, so I'm in the loop. If an issue needs attention by an airline employee, just saunter over to their help desk at the airport. Will a travel agent in North America stay awake all hours and be able to easily handle issues when I am out of country and in a dramatically different time zone?

Looks like folks are pretty convinced that doing it yourself is the way to go :-)

To answer some questions - 1) This will not be an around the world flight, but it would involve 2 continents. I'm aware that there are special airline programs for around the world flights involving a certain number of flight segments and would be happy to hear any experiences. 2) My 'understanding' regarding the purchase of overseas tickets often being less expensive when a travel agent does it is based on a memory that while US airlines have been deregulated and therefore the best airfare price for a US domestic flight is often available directly from the airline that international airfares (from the US to another country) are still regulated so that a TA (especially on more expensive airfares like Business class) might receive a sales incentive from an airline that might end up effecting the airfare. I admit this is a hazy memory... and 3) To some degree since this trip will be different in duration, distance, complexity and 'level of service desired' than the trips I've planned for us in the past - I just wanted to hear some comments on the concept of a TA.

I'm a fully connected geek - I built my first PC in 1978 and know what TCP/IP stands for :-) - so I'm comfortable doing my own online research. Perhaps running an empirical test is the best advice - just put a local TA on the job and see what they come up with.

To get back to the original post ...

this time the trip will not only involve more locations/stages/flights, but we plan to fly/ride/stay in a more "Business class" style than we have traveled in the past (think "coach" :-).

There are travel agents and tour operators specializing in "luxury" or "business class" style travel. Perhaps check out the Virtuoso Travel Network for example.

Also, major airline consolidators sell through travel agents - so if you are seeking to compare international business class or first class air fares, it might be worth your while to consult an experienced travel specialist.

If it were me, and I was arranging an overseas "trip of a lifetime", yes, I would certainly research where I wanted to go, and I might have some special requirements in mind, but I wouldn't under estimate the services that an experienced travel specialist may be able to provide.

To get a travel agent to do all the grunt work so that you can compare prices but not use his/her services in the end, seems a bit mean to me. Unless of course the TA bills you no matter what your conclusion.

To echo what most everyone else has said... do it yourself or be very sure that your TA knows Europe. I am reminded of my trip to Italy last year. In the hotel the night before my departure home, I overheard a woman talking about the group she was leading. She was talking to an Italian man about currency conversion asking where she could get her dollars changed to Euros.He was looking at her in a questioning manner (like why would you do that?). I just had to break in and tell her there was no need to convert $$ to Euros, that she should just use her ATM card. She was shocked!!!! After further discussion, she had told her group of 4 women to bring dollars to convert to Euros. And she had no idea where to go at the airport to get the train, how to get tickets, pickpocket warnings, etc. And she was leading the group! I have often wondered what happened to this group of women. I hope they had a great trip since the women in the group had nothing but great things to say about the leader.
Full disclosure. I used a TA for my airfare this year. For hotels and transport, no. And this will be the last time I use her. After so many trips, you just get confident enough in your own abilities to do it yourself. It took me about 5 years to come to this conclusion. Too bad because I like the woman.

Bruce,

A few thoughts on your questions.....

I always use a travel agent for booking my trans-atlantic flights for several reasons. I start by researching flights on the airline websites to find the dates and times that suit my schedule, and get an idea of the prices. I never use sites like Priceline, Expedia, Travelocity or similar, as I prefer to avoid the middleman. Once I have an idea which flights I want, I go to the travel agent and ask her to book them. While I could certainly book directly with the airlines, I prefer to use a T.A. for the "big ticket" flights even though there's a small additional fee for doing that. I've found in the past that the T.A. can often find better routing and flight times and in a few cases slightly cheaper flights. This approach was especially useful this year, as I needed to cancel my original return flights and book new ones, and the T.A. did an exemplary job with that at a time when I wasn't able to.

With budget flights in Europe, I always book those myself. I highly doubt that a travel agent would be able to save you any money with those. Passengers who buy tickets as soon as they become available get the cheapest prices on budget airlines, and the costs often increase on a "sliding scale" as the flight fills up.

Just curious, was the computer you built in 1978 an IMSAI, Altair or similar?

As an academic exercise, I visited a major and quality travel agency and connected to the website. Dates were entered for next spring - two nights in a hotel, located in one of my favored cities in Europe. Of the results, the closest to the city center, my preference, revealed a nice hotel. It's more than twice the distance from one I've booked in the past (family owned, operated) and would happily book again. The cost spread was $100 more as well. Rick's advice about more money than time regarding tours seems to apply to using travel agents/agencies as well. Just my opinion.

I think a lot of of people misunderstand the workings of a travel agent.

If you only stay in small towns, in tiny "hotels" with one or two rooms that are not connected to the internet, of course the travel agent won't know about these. They may only have one request like that in their entire career.

If you are trying to stay in small B & B's, travel agents probably won't know those either.

A Travel Agent is good for booking cruises, tours, package deals and in some cases, airfare.

Think about who mostly goes to see a travel agent? Savvy travelers who are all over the internet trying to learn about places to see, discounts to be had, etc? Or the couple who walks into a travel agent and says they want to go to Europe? It's the latter. These people don't want to do any planning, or learning, or thinking. They want the travel agent to do everything for them. They want hotels that are comfortable to their standards--I.e. Americanized--told what to see, where to go, and when.

The next time you pass by a travel agent. Look at the posters and brochures. Are they for two or three room zimmers in Miniskulstein, Germany or for cruises, tours and resorts?

Personally, I don't use travel agents because in the past most have not done as good a job as I have. If I was going on a cruise or to a resort, I might see if a travel agent can get me a better deal. But since those aren't my thing, I plan it myself.

I traveled between continents on one trip and it's no different than traveling on one.

And by the way, international airfares are not regulated. Routes are regulated but not the fares.

To use or not use the services of a travel agent, that's an individual decision based mainly on what you are comfortable with. Admittedly, I have used a travel agent for a few trips, 4 out of 22, mainly for buying the plane ticket and rail pass. I'm in the "do it myself" camp without the service/advice of a travel agent, using the internet, guide books, tour guide books to plan and plot out the details of a trip.

If I were stuck in Frankfurt at night (in the above example), I would not use my cell phone...not an option, and had to make a drastic change in travel plans, no need to go a travel agent, I would go an internet cafe, (I know where they are), and call myself the airline using phone cards which I always carry while in Germany to make the necessary arrangements from Frankfurt Hbf. Something similar happened in 2013 after being on the trip for 10 days, ie a drastic family emergency, took the S-8 the next day from Munich Hbf to MUC to change the needed plane ticket back

With regard to "...Savvy travelers ... people don't want to do any planning, or learning, or thinking. ...told what to see, where to go, and when." Bit of a harsh, blanket indictment don't you think? There are plenty of savvy travelers (including many on this forum) that plan, learn, think and decide for themselves what to see, where to go and when use travel agents when the circumstances indicate that is the best thing to do. Everyone is different and all should not be painted with the same brush stroke.

The use of a travel agent is up to you. We have not used a travel agent for our trips to Europe because we tend to fly into one city and out of another city, book our own hotels and car.

However on a trip to Asia, involving flights, a cruise, land tour to China, which involved 9 flights we used a travel agent. I do not know what the fees were; they were embedded in the price. Worth every penny.

Taking Frank II 's words out of context, made them appear quit harsh, but when read in context, I think he has some valid points. Some people don't enjoy planning trips, or they are going to a resort or cruise where an agent can offer certain perks. If an agent can get me the same price and $200 onbord credit for a cruise, I'll go with the agent. But that agent wouldn't be up-to-date on a tiny inn in the Val de Gardena. I need this forum and the local website for that.

I agree with Frank II. And he said "mostly" ...so as not to paint with a broad brush. Travel agents should be able to wring out savings through volume-based contracts. If you're in the market for a packaged standard deal, then getting group rates should in theory be superior than trying to negotiate on your own. The only tradeoff is you'd be steered toward those products for which the travel agent has leverage over and aligns with their incentive structure. There's nothing inherently wrong with that but it's going to be a different product type than say the smaller, more unique properties (in the case of lodging).

When someone goes online (say Expedia) and buys a package deal constituting of a flight, lodging, and rental car, they are also using a type of travel agent/consolidator except it's a virtual one. So when someone asks about "travel agents", it's easy to forget that there are very different models out there now caused by migration of services to the web. It's not just a person sitting in an office picking up the phone (i.e. the traditional agent we tend to think of).

Taken out of context? Perhaps. If so, apologies to all if anyone was miffed. However, despite a perceived implication, there are many savvy travelers who make their own decisions and still use a travel agent under certain conditions.

We used a travel agent back before the internet was around. But, now I think I can do a better job myself because I know what it is I'm looking for to meet our personal desires.

I spend hours and hours researching, planning, organizing, etc. far more than a TA would have time to do for me. I agree with others that a TA is a good choice if you don't want to bother with any planning and you want it done for you.

Since I spend so much time in planning I basically get to experience the trip before we even leave. I know lots of details about the neighborhood we are staying in (and the neighborhood I've chosen), I've "walked" to the metro already via google maps, I've found possible restaurants where I want to eat, and know my plans inside and out. So, I've gained so much valuable information that I just couldn't get with someone else making the plan for me. So, for me, it is the best way. But, if that isn't your thing, then a TA is a great choice.