How Do Travel Agents Get Paid? A Question I Hear Every Day...
Through the summer I read about first the airlines, then the cruiselines and finally resorts charging their guests and customers “fuel surcharges”. Now every day I read where airlines, cruise lines and other suppliers of hospitality services are (with some guidelines) reducing, or eliminating all together, the fuel surcharges they initiated during the summer of historically high fuel prices.
Travel agents were the front line recipients of consumer complaints about these charges. And travel agents were equally chargrined about the charges. No one was exempt from paying them, including travel agents. And, in the case of the cruise lines, while we had to tell our clients about the fuel surcharges, collect the fuel surcharges and take some heat for the fuel surcharges, we did not get paid a commission on any of the surcharges. Fuel surcharges and non-commissionable fees & taxes often caused the price of a cruise to more than double from the advertised “cabin” price. And the cabin price is what travel agents earn their living from. Those surcharges, along with non-commissionable fees and taxes, moneys spent on excursions and activities, and money spent on goods and services while onboard a ship, are all non-commissionable moneys the cruise lines keep in their own coffers.
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Travel agents were the front line recipients of consumer complaints about these charges. And travel agents were equally chargrined about the charges. No one was exempt from paying them, including travel agents. And, in the case of the cruise lines, while we had to tell our clients about the fuel surcharges, collect the fuel surcharges and take some heat for the fuel surcharges, we did not get paid a commission on any of the surcharges. Fuel surcharges and non-commissionable fees & taxes often caused the price of a cruise to more than double from the advertised “cabin” price. And the cabin price is what travel agents earn their living from. Those surcharges, along with non-commissionable fees and taxes, moneys spent on excursions and activities, and money spent on goods and services while onboard a ship, are all non-commissionable moneys the cruise lines keep in their own coffers.
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