Need to book 80 airfares. Who do you recommend?

[jinxy09]

Hi Everyone

Planning a trip with people within my company for March next year and there are 84 people who will be travelling.

Hoping someone can recommend a good corporate travel agent or suggestions on how to get the best flight deal for MEL to LAX for that many people.

Normally do most of the bookings myself in the past, however this trip is a little too much time for me to handle and don't want to mess up so many components of the trip.

 

[thewinchester]

Before you begin...

There are some questions you will need to ask before making a single phone call. From your scenairo, the following questions come to mind:

1. Does your company have an existing relationship with a travel booker?
2. Does your company have a preferred airline/carrier?
3. Is the company intending to pay for all the travel, or are the individual pax expected to handle payment for the flights?
4. How much do you spend on travel currently, and if this is significant amount to gain further leverage on the price by consolidating the travel booking relationship?
5. Will the frequent flyer/alliance status of the most senior people travelling have any influence on airline selection?
6. What ancillary services will you need for this trip of 84 people? Good travel booking companies can seamlessly handle everything you'll need after arrival, from hotel accomodation, airport and hotel transfers. If you can package these into the whole service offering, this can further help drive down the overall price whilst enhancing the level of service and reduction of work required.

Strategy

Most airlines will offer group booking, which can adapt to your needs specially if you're intending for individual pax to pay.

As this is a pretty serious and sizable booking, I would recommend the following strategy;

1. Make contact with the Group Bookings desk of all possible airlines (this will enable you to get a baseline figure of what you might expect to pay, good for budgeting purposes)
2. Make contact with a corporate travel booking company (either existing, or new ones if no existing relationship). Companies you can contact include QBT, Carlson Wagonlit, and Corporate Traveller (corp arm of Flight Centre), and others using a Google search.
3. Make sure that however you decide to set up this booking, that you do as little of the work as possible. Your end solution should provide as much self-service, while offloading as much of the work onto the airline or travel company. All you want to worry about is setting up the deal, guiding people so they can get any required visas in time, and if relevant making the final payment.

Also, make sure you consider all carriers servicing the route that are relevant to the passengers aboard (I mean carriers the bosses won't turn their noses up at). An easy list of carriers servicing the route can be found using FareCompare.

Recommendations

I've personally used Carlson's whilst in Government and have had no problems with them. I have found their staff on our accounts very proactive, to the point of where I changed an itinerary of mine directly with a carrier - they caught this instantly (even before the change was completed) then called up our PA to confirm this was authorised and all ok.

 

[pauly7]

Hi Everyone

Planning a trip with people within my company for March next year and there are 84 people who will be travelling.

Hoping someone can recommend a good corporate travel agent or suggestions on how to get the best flight deal for MEL to LAX for that many people.

Normally do most of the bookings myself in the past, however this trip is a little too much time for me to handle and don't want to mess up so many components of the trip.

QBT are outstanding for this sort of thing, have used them for similar events and they have excelled. Got great group discounts and an account manager who was across every detail. Doesn't matter how big or small your request is, they are all over it.

Highly recommend them

Good luck with your event.

EDIT: We have used Corporate traveller before, wouldn't again - they were slow, let things slip through the cracks and weren't proactive, along with a lot of huffing and puffing when you needed to change something or had a special request.

 

[Travel Guru]

I'm curious why you're looking specifically at a Corporate TA instead of someone who specialises in Groups perhaps?

As a TA, if I wasn't in the industry, I'd be looking at someone with groups experience to organise my group travel as organising groups can either be a breeze or an absolute nightmare for the company/individual putting the trip together depending on who they bring on board to organise it for them.

TG

 

[StevePER]

I've personally used Carlson's whilst in Government and have had no problems with them.

I find them terrible. So does our secretary who has to battle with them every month to get them to email tax invoices that make sense.

 

[thewinchester]

I find them terrible. So does our secretary who has to battle with them every month to get them to email tax invoices that make sense.

We were all using purchasing cards, so it was never a problem for us. We paid when booked, received the email invoice and it was all done.

 

[docjames]

I find them terrible. So does our secretary who has to battle with them every month to get them to email tax invoices that make sense.

+1 to this. Every dealing with them has been difficult (as an end user ie. the person travelling but not responsible for balancing the travel budgets etc).

I'd second the comments to spend a bit of time ringing around now to the airlines to see what sort of things they can do directly, and perhaps then on or two TAs who specialise in groups.

Failing all of those options, i'm happy to recommend my (Melbourne-based) TA if you'd like to PM me.

 

[jinxy09]

Thanks for the replies so far.

To probably clarify a few things clearer.

It is my company that i am the owner of, and I have never had a personal TA or Corporate agent handle any of my travel in the past (have always done it myself, however did use Escape Travel once for a group of 18)

I have been calling every airline and awaiting some quotes however finding the prices especially for the dates I am asking for (off peak, and i know what the price guide should be around) ridiculously expensive!

I am not fussed whether it is an excellent TA experienced in large groups or something else, however good communication, a friendly phone and email manner, and no request too difficult are my priorities when giving my business to someone, in what will be (with accommodation and transfers) a very costly trip.

 

[Travel Guru]

I don't source business off the forum, I'm on here purely to interact and contribute (though I do look after travel for several forum members), but I'm happy to have a chat with you and give you some advice and tips if you want to PM me.

You'll generally find Group airfare rates aren't as competitively priced as your standard specials, but there's good reason for it, as you'll rarely get enough seats on the discounted fares to get everyone on, and the group fares come with a lot more flexibility than your standard airfare.

As I said, feel free to PM if you want some advice.

TG