And I suppose you haven’t had a reply from Manos either Darren?
Interesting that with both BBC Breakfast and GMTV covering On Line V Travel Agents that the CAA also brought the following article out.
CAA issues 2007 ‘DIY’ holiday risk warning

Consumers are being warned to check that their air holidays are covered against insolvency during the new year peak booking period for the summer.

The Civil Aviation Authority estimates that more than 18 million people will organise their own ‘DIY’ holidays using different travel components this summer.

The CAA alert came after the failure of HCCT (Holidays) Limited, trading as CT2 and Loco Flights, which collapsed before Christmas. The CAA repatriated 1,000 holidaymakers from Tenerife and is making refunds to all customers with advance bookings.

CAA spokesman David Clover said: “The failure of HCCT Holidays highlighted to the many people who booked flights with the company the value of ATOL protection: the organisation of repatriation flights by the CAA at no extra cost, and the guarantee of a full refund for those unable to travel.

“We estimate that over 18 million consumers will build their own holidays this summer by buying flights separately, rather than booking their whole holiday with a single travel organiser or tour operator. Many will book accommodation or car hire with different companies.”

Clover added: “Many families will be planning and saving for their annual overseas getaway, and some will be thinking about putting this together themselves, rather than choosing to book their whole holiday with a tour operator.

“But what many people won’t realise is that they will only get the same comprehensive protection as HCCT’s customers if they book with an ATOL-protected tour operator, otherwise their money could be at risk if just one part of their itinerary goes wrong.

“Many consumers want independent holidays away from the traditional holiday package image. However, many ATOL tour operators now provide flexible holidays to meet these new demands, and protect their customers.

“It is important that consumers are able to make informed decisions about holiday protection. If consumers prefer to put something together themselves, they should think about other protection, like insurance or paying by credit card that will provide some cover.

“But be careful. Many insurance policies do not automatically cover insolvency, so read the small print, and debit cards do not provide the same cover as credit cards.”

Darren, I think you need to make a Clear distinction between the terms Travel Agents and Tour Operators, here. There are lots of Good On-Line Travel Agents.
The main confusion is The Brochure Price that a Tour Operator Gives against the Price given by that Tour Operator via Viewdata or Web systems to Travel Agents and then the Tour Operators Price given direct to the Consumer for not booking with a Travel Agent.

The Bubble has to burst sometime and the Major Operators are cutting their own throats over pricing. Look at the amount of Independent Travel Agencies who no longer rack and sell Thomson

As an Aito ( Association of Independent Tour Operators) Specialist Travel Agency, We feature and recommend over 150 good Quality tour Operators that can often be better value than the multiple Operators, and are rest assured that the Price stated in the brochure or on the phone is the same whether you book with Agent or direct with the operator. The Standard of service with AITO members is generally 100% better as well.

These days People want to pay less and less, and when that happens generally Standards decline.

The Old saying, ” You get what you pay for” certainly applies to the Holiday Industry

I would like to add my concern over a “News” item that appeared in London’s METRO paper yesterday with a title “Save £460 by booking hols online”, written by Sarah Getty who refers to a Holiday Which report, edited by Lorna Cowan. She says that ” A family of two adults and a child can save £468 on a two-week holiday in Majorca by booking online with Thomas Cook compared with its Brochure price”. Clearly, neither the people who prepared the Holiday Which report in the first place, nor the people who publish this report for public consumption know very little about the subject of pricing in the travel industry. The brochure price is hardly ever the price people actually pay, even when they use a travel agent who can also provide useful information, advice and guidance in the process. Why do people think that it is clever to know the price of everything but the value of nothing?…More importantly, such half-facts that are thrusted onto unsuspecting public may actually cause more harm than good. Does anyone agree?

People will always think it is “clever to know the price” of a product because, unfortunately, travel is one of the most highly commoditised industries in modern business.

Hi Kevin,
With due respect, I think you are missing the point here. We all know about ‘Competing on Price’ as just ONE of the marketing strategies that businesses can employ. Alternatively, businesses can compete on ‘differentiation’ or ‘focus’ (See Marketing Strategies’ by Michael Porter - a classic). However, it would still be mislaeding to compare the price printed on a brochure, which may be printed some months in advance due to lead time in preparing these documents, and the actual price which may be available not just online, but also at a travel agent when a booking is actually made. For most cases, the prices are dynamic due to availability, supply and demand levels at a particular point in time, and also due to possible tactical campaigns. Therefore, my point still is that comparing brochure prices to online prices would at best lead to a spurious conclusion, and therefore is misleading. This has to be wrong when the apparent attempt is to provide ‘useful’ information.

i don’t believe we were being critical of your post, Alper. and i suspect you are missing the point of our comment.

we were pointing out that commoditisation has meant consumers are very much fixated on price, especially as price is a key factor online. therefore this is why publications such as Which? and others are happy to produce investigations that highlight the differences between price.

Hi Kevin,

Yes, I agree with you on that point, these reports certainly make interesting reads. I

Maybe you should do a survey Darren??

Contact six online travel companies and see how many respond within 48 hours.

to do a survey effectively, in order to gauge the response to queries, Rants would surely have to book six holidays…

even Darren and his vast empire of holiday homes can’t stretch to that amount of Research & Development, surely?!!?

I suppose we shouldn’t expect everything.

We can’t expect a cheap holiday and perfect services, but we should expect a reply to an email at the minimum.

[...] When Darren asked me to guest blog during his trip to Oslo, I thought great, a chance to rant, why not live up to the name. Although I do have a blog for my travel business, Europe a la Carte, I feel I have more of licence to rant here. What aspect of travel makes me want to rant, it’s poor customer service. I looked at Travel Rants and saw that Darren had recently blogged on this topic. [...]

[...] poor customer service.  I looked at Travel Rants and saw that Darren had recently blogged on this topic. Darren reckoned that a high percentage of online travel companies would fail a basic customer [...]