Sunday, March 5, 2017
Technology Made Travel Agents Obsolete Now Its Saving Them BW
Technology Made Travel Agents Obsolete Now Its Saving Them BW
Booking travel feels old-school, no matter how you spin it: Such sites as Expedia and Orbitz have barely updated their layouts since 1999, and dialing a travel agent hardly feels appropriate in the age of Uber. That?s about to change, thanks to a series of disruptive travel services that are blending human intelligence with mobile technology. The goal: striking a middle ground in an industry where the personal touch still means something, but the bottom-line savings of D.I.Y. tech is hard to beat.
Whom it?s for: The time-crunched and independent-minded
What it costs: $400 for an annual membership, billed only when you make your first booking
?People have been writing our epitaphs forever,? said Jack Ezon, president of leading agency Ovation Travel and co-founder of Skylark, a members-only website and app that caters to the luxury leisure market. ?Until recently,? he said, ?our agency?s high-end customers weren?t going online?the internet was really a mass market space.? That has changed in the last few years, as every five-star company from Four Seasons to Aman began moving their business to the web.
Enter Skylark, which is catering to a new psychographic that Ezon described as the ?do-it-yourself until you don?t want to? economy: sophisticated types who know what they want, know how to find it, but simply can?t add to their to-do lists. For a $400 annual fee, they can browse a vetted list of seven to eight hotel-and-airfare packages, all offered at discounted agency rates, and then book within a matter of minutes. Members get the perks of booking with an agent?24/7 customer service, automatic rebookings in the event of flight cancelations, free upgrades, and so on?minus the back and forth. (Skylark is invite-only while in beta mode, and will open to the public by yearend.)
?We merge online and offline,? said Ezon of Skylark?s model. ?Every digital transaction is paired with a live travel specialist who you can contact by phone, IM, e-mail ? however you want.? The service will help you coordinate a scavenger hunt for the kids in Rio or get VIP access tickets to the British Museum in London, for instance.
In a recent test, we found discounts that ranged from insignificant ($33 off a four-night stay at the Hotel Vernet in Paris) to impressive (29 percent off flights to London and a stay at the Corinthia). The best results come from package deals, which protect both hotel and airline from revealing specific discounts and damaging their price integrity.
Available link for download
