Julian2 Posted February 12, 2007 Report Share Posted February 12, 2007 If it was a franchise office ...they have to use what we call preferd suppliers. so will always start with those brouchers..and then move around to non prefered wholesalers... Reason: commission is better and we get a incentive payment if targets are met...can be 100k that is why it is done... Yeah, I know you gotta make a quid TB, I just wish there was a way for regular fliers who don't mind doing a bit of work to shave costs. The big guys ignore customer loyalty, I had a frequent customer card with Flight Center/Escape Travel with a couple of hundred bucks on it and was told they'd scrapped the program and woops, you guessed it, no record of my points. Last time in Oz I got a one way ticket; I buy flights in Thailand now, put my money where I live. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nkped Posted February 12, 2007 Report Share Posted February 12, 2007 For personal travel, basically no. A couple of years ago, I would do it for booking BKK trips because cancelling/rescheduling with some airlines like Korean and China Air or even Orbitz was a bit dicey because of the requirement to return the paper tickets. With the spread of e-ticketing for international travel, that has pretty much gone away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thalenoi Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Pitty you don't have "Often use travel agent" in your choices. Out of LOS I always have a better deal with an agent, but I find their fares on the net and mail them from there on: try to book online, 5555, never works out; Out of Europe I always book online. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khunsanuk Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Hi, And what sites do you guys use? I just checked www.thaifly.com and www.flights.com, but neither was that great (flights.com especially quotes insanely high prices). Sanuk! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dumsoda Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 KS, All mine is done from Oz, so not sure if appropriate, but I have found Zuji to be OK on occasions. (Think they operate world wide) Then again a lot of the time you can't get specific flights (eg Midnite departures) at the cheap prices they quote. I always use the quotes as a base and generally end up going through our Agent at same or sometimes better prices. Cheers DS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.. Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Http://www.traveller2000.com but I usually just call my girl and she gets it done (she works for T2K). Easier than the web. Cheers, SD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coops Posted March 3, 2007 Report Share Posted March 3, 2007 Just completed an entertaining time getting flights from bangkok return to Geneva for a skiing holiday.... asked my GF to book some options well over a month ago.... KLM were cheap but full. Swiss air was available at a high price. Thai then Swiss from zurich to geneva was a decent price, but seats from bkk to zurich were on waitlist.... for weeks - with my thai freq flyer code. So, i get back to bangkok from work - the thai flight is still on waitlist (checked the status on Amadeus myself). Check with travel agaent who says this option is 'ok'. Yeah, right.... We ended up using two agents - neither of whom got us a suitable flight - one who i repeatedly phoned up and left my number never called back. These agaents have been used by us/family before... Go to Emporium, check at the travel agent there. No seats in economy at all with a star alliance airline (all the options have one change in Zurich). !!! And this is after checking on swissair.com the previous evening, and finding no problem with seats..... Walk out the shop over to the internet cafe area... go to swissair.com and book and pay for 2 return tickets bangkok, zurich, geneva return - on the dates i requested. No problem except for the price..... about 96,000 baht EACH !!!!! Did check before paying that they were refunable ;-), but booked them anyway just as security.... Once back home, looked around on the internet. Interestingly, expedia was quoting same kind of absurd prices or higher (!) on Lufthansa and swissair.... and i'm not too keen to go Turkish via Istanbul... ahem. Checked on orbitz.com - that's when i realized i'd forgotten another obvious choice from thailand - thru the middle east ie Dubai or Abu Dhabi, or Qatar for that matter. Decent new planes and decent prices - and Emirates tend to take the friendly Aussie stewardesses and leave the grumpy bitches for Qantas :-) . End of it is, go to the Etihad website. Just under 30,000 baht each. And you can book your seat at the same time you make your online booking. Eticket. Sorted. Phoned swiiair in bangkok and cancelled my ticketds with them. It seems like now, airlines are reserving seats for online bookings in preference or even exclusion to travel agents - i'm sure this used to be the reverse case not too long ago.... coops Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exit2dos Posted March 3, 2007 Report Share Posted March 3, 2007 Do you feel comfortable putting your credit card information, on line, at an internet shop, to buy your ticket? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torneyboy Posted March 3, 2007 Report Share Posted March 3, 2007 They black out heaps of seats so we can't see the true number of live seats to book...we see 9 that tells us the flight is no way full...however then they realese the damn seats and make us look stupid as i just told you i can not get the number of seats you need ...bang now they are there...drives us nuts ...December to march in the main... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torneyboy Posted March 3, 2007 Report Share Posted March 3, 2007 Ok..if you are just buying point to point flights you are doing the right thing.... :thumbup: But go back to the starving agent and buy travel insurance at least so he can eat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.