Destination Travel & Tours

In these days of Internet, people often think its better to buy on-line to get lower fare and faster service. The New York Times did a comparison of making travel plans on-line vs through a travel agent.  Here is what they found:

Nearly every time, travel agents bested the Internet big boys on both price (the objective part of the test) and service (what you might call the essay question). In other words, the agents suggested alternate routes, gave advice on visas and just generally acted, well, more human than their computer counterparts. (All research was all done in mid-January for trips in March.)
You can read more here.

People cherish memories of a family vacation for life long.  It's always great feeling when you help people plan their vacation.   One of my customers well planned trip got interupted due to the Volcanic Ash Cloud.   After series of itinerary changes, it's always a pleasure to see them take off with a smile.   Here's a letter I would like to share with you today:

"I have had the pleasure of working with Sveta Shah when she was with Silver Eagle Travels and now with Destination Travel & Tours over the past few years. I have traveled a lot, and have also handled travel arrangements on my own using the internet. However, I have learned that working with a travel agent, especially Sveta, can in the long run be more comfortable and even economical.
Donna and I toured Southwestern Europe during the April vacation week with two teenagers. Sveta handled all logistics from finding an agency to work with months ahead to build a custom tour for us that covered Paris, Barcelona and Madrid, made all flight arrangements, did whatever were needed to work around when unexpected challenges arose during the tour to assure that we still had a safe and wonderful time, and handled all the financial aspects regarding payments and refunds accurately and on time.
The eruption of  Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland grounded all flights to Europe for a week and threatened this April tour. Sveta worked hard to rearrange the itinerary by reordering the cities we visited in such a way as to still maximize our time in Europe.
Sveta's diligence and professionalism put our mind at ease and enabled us to get most important thing we willingly paid for - to have a good time far away from home with our teenagers that we all will remember for the rest of our lives.
Sveta was accessible on the phone and via e-mails throughout despite the fact that she was bedridden and convalescing after a surgery. We could always count on Sveta to respond to our e-mails promptly with direct and thoughtful answers to our questions, and take prompt action on requests.
We look forward to working with Sveta on our future tours to Africa, Southern Europe, Alaska, and Eastern Europe."

Srinivasan Ravikumar

If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is! I had first hand experience by buying tickets online using Orbitz. A friend called to mention the round-trip fare of $554 including taxes from Chicago to Mumbai on Orbitz. Note, the total price was $40 for fare and $514 for taxes and other airport charges. It was too low to resist even for a travel agent so we ended up buying four tickets at different travel dates for family visits.  First, came the good news from Orbitz confirming the reservation. See the attached email from Orbitz. We called our family in India letting them know about the plans, with everyone jumping for joy, we were all smiles. Then, the next morning I was unfortunately brought to the real world. Orbitz claimed that the airline did not have enough seats and thus cancelling my booking. In fact, they cancelled all the bookings even though they were at different times. I thought that this was just a scam, thus deteriorating my hopes of finding a good ticket price online. See the attached cancellation email from Orbitz. As you can imagine, the smiles turned to frowns and everyone was unhappy. With this in mind, I quickly started joking about this with my friends and all was well, but that lost time and excitement can never be replaced.

Lessons Learned – The Internet is great at bringing the efficiency and lowering cost of doing business. It has helped me to start my own small business over the Internet and with lower cost than renting my own office and creating a personal line with associated office expenses. This in turn has helped me to pass on the savings to you while still providing personalized services and look after your interest. However, with the Orbitz experience I have learned that you still have to watch for what you are getting into.  In addition to this, I have also learned there is no substitution for personalized service, which is my number one priority. This experience has made me think to create a new motto of the company --- “We make sure you GO!”.

Please note I am not discouraging you or anyone for that matter to purchase items from the internet. So, if you can please share your experiences as comments so others as well as myself can learn from this experience.
NOTE: When I send you the confirmation e-mail , it is from the airline with seat assignments and you will NOT have to wait 24 hours.