Will travel agents become a dying breed, trampled under the e-stampede which assures instant flight and hotel bookings via the Internet? The hi-tech scene has taken on gold-rush proportions over the past few weeks, and the Pacific Asia Travel Association (Pata) looks at the perceived threat to the high-street agent in its latest newsletter, Issues Trends.
Pata says independent research in the United Kingdom 'found Britain's biggest tour operators preparing to use e-commerce to move from agent-based to direct distribution via the Internet'.
'The need to cut costs and commissions paid to agents make that group an obvious target. The survey points to an expected reduction in business conducted through agents of at least 15 per cent over the next three years.' The survey found that tour operators plan to expand the range of services offered to customers via the Internet.
I asked Brian Smith, general manager of Travel Advisers here, what he makes of it all. Mr Smith has been dealing with the public in Hong Kong for more than 40 years, and his company specialises in tailor-made holidays for the individual and families.
'It's OK if you want to book, for example, a ticket from Hong Kong to Singapore over the Net, but what happens when you want to book HK-Singapore-Phnom Penh-Timbuktu and when you want to make a connection they tell you the flight is full and they have no record of your booking? You say you booked on the Internet, but who can you talk to about it? It's fine until something goes wrong, and that is when you need the human touch.' Mr Smith said he could see problems arising when people arrive at their destination with a ticket booked on the Internet only to find that they cannot get into that country because they need a visa, and no one told them because they did it all through a machine.
He added: 'I was talking to another agent the other day who believes people are getting fed up with doing things through machines and prefer to talk to a human who will give them advice and take an interest in them.' Pata says over the next few years the mobile phone will be transformed with the introduction of GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) from a mere voice communicator into a lifestyle tool. Mobile Internet services would allow mobile users to browse the Net, view e-mail and access company intranets, more than five times faster than they can by sitting at a desk. It looks like travel agents could be in for tough competition.