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Information on how to Can You Make Any Money Selling Airline Tickets?Let me give you a straight forward answer - yes and no! :-) Seriously, if you are planning on making money selling domestic air travel, don't waste you time. On the other hand, International air travel is another story and I'll get to that in a minute. Almost all domestic airlines no longer pay commissions to travel agencies. The only way travel agencies can afford to sell airline tickets is if they charge a service fee, typically $25, over and above the retail price of the ticket. If you as an independent travel agent "sell" the ticket you may or may not earn your percentage of that $25. I say, "may or may not" because some host agencies have simply said that they cannot afford to pay any "commission" to the independent travel agent. I personally have never sold air by itself. The only way I will handle the air portion is if it is a part of a cruise or leisure vacation package and it is available thru the supplier. I simply tell the client that they can get just as good a price booking their flights over the Internet as I can get for them - and if they do it themselves they will have full control over which airlines, flights, and times they want to fly. Now, let's talk about International flights. Here the independent travel agent can make some money if they work it right. There are people called "consolidators" who purchase blocks of seats on International flights a big discounts off the retail price. They add a small profit for themselves and resell them at prices that are still substantially below the regular retail price. They sell the ticket to the host travel agency at a "net" price. The host travel agency then adds whatever commission they feel they can charge to the price of the ticket and sells it to the passenger. Assuming that the host travel agency does not get too greedy, the end price usually still comes out to be lower than the regular retail price and is a good deal for the client. As an independent travel agent you will earn your share of that commission. Because of the high price of most International airline tickets, you, the travel agent, can actually make a reasonable profit for the time you spend working with the client. If your real interest is just in getting cheap airfare, check out some of these resources. Priceline wants to save you a few hundred dollars - I had never been much of a fan of Priceline until I saw a study showing that they are actually the cheapest of the flight-booking sites. Now I see these package deals and I think they are probably great prices: Save up to $325 on Big City Packages! Priceline has these offers whereby you can book [...]Get the best deal on international flights - Part of my job is to find the best travel deals I can and then write about them here, but this summer it’s been challenging. Hotel deals can be pretty good, but airfares are rough. This is probably your best deal for international flights: Vayama.com – Compare 100’s of international airfares on one web site. Their [...] Expedia has several last-minute hotels under $40 per night - With airline prices so high it’s really nice to come across some excellent deals this summer, and this is one of them: Last-Minute Hotel Deals at Expedia.com I’ll admit that the ‘under $40 per night’ hotels I mentioned are in Las Vegas and Orlando, but those are still like half the normal price or even [...] This Coupon Code expires today, so get on it! - Coupon Code Mondays have been a big favorite among our regular readers, and I’m not sure if this week will go over well or not. This code expires today, June 30, although there is a chance they’ll extend it for a month based on our recent discussions with Travelocity: Take $50 Off Las Vegas Last [...] Cheap Caribbean lives up to their name with this deal - While some of us are scrambling for good deals for the summer, people who think ahead are already planning their fall trips, and those people have just hit the jackpot with this: Caribbean Fall Sale Getaways From $349! That’s right, you can get a one-week deal for $349 to Barbados including air. I’m really not sure [...] In honor of summer, Funjet has hot deals - You may remember that I wasn’t originally too fond of Funjet because of their silly sounding name, but the more I look at their offers the more I like what I see. Funjet is currently offering some very tempting packages they call “hot deals”: Hot Vacation Deals Funjet Vacations offers hot deals on travel packages. Check [...] Southwest has great deals on family vacations right now - Regular readers of this column know I’m not a huge fan of some aspects of Southwest Airlines, but also that their vacations department does a really good deal arranging discounts. Right now they are offering some pretty good deals on family vacations and I thought you guys might want to know about it: Southwest [...] Beach vacations are on sale, and not a moment too soon - The weather is heating up all over, so many of us are thinking of booking a trip on the beach somewhere. The fine people at Expedia have just blessed us with a pretty nice sale: Book your Beach Travel on Expedia.com: Plan a sunny, sandy escape! They’ve got good trips to Hawaii, Florida, Puerto Rico, Mexico, [...] Coupon Code Mondays are heading south of the border once again! - You already know that this is our Coupon Code Monday spectacular, and this week we are heading back to Mexico with this great last-minute offer: Take $75 Off Mexico Last Minute Packages. Use PROMO CODE: MEX75OFF. Expires 7/31/08. This is called a Promo Code again, but these things work exactly as coupon codes do, so [...] Up to 50% plus free nights! What are we waiting for? - Searching for great travel deals for this column becomes a bit more challenging during summer, but I guess I wasn’t looking in the right places because this one is stunning: Save 50% off Sandals Luxury Resorts, Click Here! Regular readers know that I’m not usually big on these all-inclusive vacations, but that’s mostly because I can’t [...] Lyn Liming Copyright 2004 Lyndel Liming - All Rights Reserved |