Use a Travel Agency to Book Your Spring Break Vacation

Instead of deal directly with the airlines, has it ever occurred to you to use a good travel agency to book your spring break vacation? Airlines will quote you fares and book your flights, but that’s as far as they go. A travel agency can offer discounted fares, advice on spring break destinations, and may have a great deal or two for you and your friends. Spring break is barely two months away, so now is the ideal time to start looking for a travel agency.

If airlines are offering huge discounts to lure money-weary individuals into traveling, imagine the larger discounts that a travel agency can offer. Since travel agents purchase blocks of seats, they can pass on the savings to their customers.

There are numerous travel agencies, but there is only a fraction of those agencies that cater to the special needs of the student travel industry. Although you can use any travel agency to book your spring break vacation, why not choose a travel agency that specializes in student tours and spring break vacations?

Looking for the Right Travel Agency: Tips

Before you book your next spring break vacation, the travel agency must satisfy certain requirements. You may want to look into the following criteria:

· Full Description of Services – Does the travel agency introduce itself adequately to potential customers? Do they have contact numbers, student packages, discount programs, and do they explain the procedures for their spring break packages as well as clearly state their refund policy?

· Variety – Does the travel agency have a wide range of destination choices and do they have hotel categories that meet all budgets? Some travel agencies like to specialize in a certain number of destinations – USA, Canada, or Mexico; some cover the world! When travel agencies can book spring break vacations almost anywhere in the world, that means that they’ve been in the student travel industry long enough and are confident that they can offer far away and exotic destinations without any problems because they belong to a large network of travel professionals;

· Discounts and Deals – Does the travel agency extend discounts for group travel or do they have frequent hot deals to offer? The capability to offer great deals can mean any number of things: they have good relationships with major airlines, hotels and tourist organizations, they receive discounted rates from suppliers and they in turn offer these to student travelers, or they are booking so many flights and vacation packages that they earn free points or free miles. You could be offered a deal to the Bahamas, your destination of choice, because the travel agency happened to receive a deal from a Bahamas tour operator at the time you booked!

· Photographs – Wouldn’t it be nice to see what you are getting into? If you are going to a spring break destination for the first time, you would want to know what kind of hotel you’re staying at, wouldn’t you? It isn’t enough for the travel agency to say, “You’re booked at a 4-star hotel”. You’ll want to know the name and location of that hotel so you can look it up on the Internet or ask people about it, plus you’ll want to see the rooms, dining facilities, and recreational facilities. Some travelers have been dismayed to find out that the hotel had only one treadmill, as opposed to what the travel agency described as a “full operating gym”. Or that the travel agency said 12 tennis courts, when in fact the hotel did not have any, referring travelers instead to a sports center a mile away!

· Interactive web site –Instead of spending precious minutes on the phone asking the travel agent about destinations, packages and vacation amenities, it would be simpler to do the search yourself on their web site by giving you the option to select a city and a package. When you’ve found what you’re looking for, that is when you call and ask for details that weren’t covered on their web site.

· Flexibility – some travel agents require you to pay for their packaged vacations to be able to receive discounts, but some travel agents are flexible in that they allow you to choose only air, or only hotel, or both.

A good travel agency is well organized. This important trait is evident in the way they present travel information. For example, there are websites that are designed to specifically cater to students. They list the cities they serve with a brief article about popular attractions and then you click on a link and the screen displays what their package covers plus costs for the city you selected.

So if you’re using a travel agency to book your spring break vacation, look for an agency that’s efficient, organized and capable of offing some fantastic deals.

Jeremy Foster is a blogger and freelance writer who focuses on the travel industry and vacation tips, often discussing a particular aspect of the travel industry such as working with travel agents.

Find More : Agency Travel , Online Travel , Holidays Travel , travel agents , travel information , group travel , travel industry , travel agencies , travel agency

Exclusive Travel Agency Vacations

With the flurry of online travel booking and Do-It-Yourself travel sites, many people have lost sight of the fact that a trip can easily be booked through a travel agency - and that there are benefits which can only be found through one of these agencies. It is important to think about the various deals that you can find only through a travel agency before you begin to plan your trip. Before you start to try to do it yourself, and before you spend too much money with online travel sites or Do-It-Yourself travel sites, think about using a travel agent.

The Best Deals

Many people believe that the best deals can be found by doing the booking and the arranging of their trip on their own. However, they are forgetting that this technique can lead additional fees and taxes which travel agents will not add. They also forget that travel agents are real people, which means that you can talk to him or her about your exact needs for the trip, including any special needs you have, and they can make sure that you are taken care of. Even if a particular company advertises the best deals, when it comes right down to it, the best deals are only found through travel agencies.

Package Deals

Even though many travel companies claim that they can get you package deals - such as airfare, hotel, and car rental, in reality most of these companies are just finding deals on these three things and then sticking them together in a package that looks appealing but may not be a “deal” at all. On the other hand, travel agencies really do have contracts or agreements in place where they work with corporations that are mutually beneficial. They can actually get you a better deal on car rentals if you stay in a certain hotel, or get a better deal on airfare if you are renting a car from the right company. These are not just individual purchases stuck together, like on the travel sites. They are actual connections which are made with the travel agency through various companies for flights, car rentals, and hotels. Therefore, when you do book a package deal with a travel agency, you are getting a better deal than you would get doing it yourself.

Tour Deals

Another thing that Do-It-Yourself travel does not afford you is the benefit of getting a tour deal that a travel agency could give you. If you want to travel abroad, for example, where your vacation may cross borders into several different countries, you might have considered planning your own tour. However, if you do this, you have to worry about each individual thing - travel from one place to another, lodging, and sightseeing in each area. If you do not want to worry about all of these details, you probably want to look for a good tour deal. The only place to get a good tour deal is through a travel agency. Through a travel agency, you will be able to book all of the components of your vacation. You can tell them where you would like to go, and then the travel agency can take care of all of your arrangements. They will book your flights, your travel between each place you are going, and all of the things that you will do when you are in each town or country. They will also reserve your hotels, all of the other types of accommodations you are going to need, and take care of any other things that come up.

Group Tours

It can be really hard to book your own travels online or through each individual company by yourself. However, it is harder if you are trying to book flights, accommodations, and sight seeing packages for lots of people. Travel agencies are still the only places that can help you book group tour deals. The agencies have contracts with bus companies, hotels, restaurants, and airlines so that they can truly get you better deals when it comes to travel for a lot of different people. You can talk to a travel agent about your specific needs when it comes to group travel, and they will take care of the entire booking process for you. This means that you can book a tour for your family, your company, or your fundraiser quite easily through a travel agency.

It does not matter which type of trip you are booking or where you would like to go. A travel agency can make sure that you get there quickly and easily, as well as affordably!

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Lisa Parker is a freelance writer who covers the travel industry, often writing about specific topics such as vacation destinations and travel deals offered by a travel agency.

Find More : travel agencies , online travel , travel industry , travel agency , Agency Tour , Rent Car , Leisure Tourism