(165) Moving an IATA-Accredited Agency To US; Client Poaching On Facebook Groups!

Travel Agent Chatter | Friday 15

In episode 165 Steph is co-hosting David Meihoefer of Travel Planners International. Here’s a taste of the questions they’ll cover!

QUESTIONS

1. Hello, as a founding partner of an IATA accredited travel agency with plans to move to the United States by the end of the summer to operate from home, will I still have to go through all the stages of ARC-IATAN? Could HAR provide me with end-to-end support in this regard considering your 7 day agency setup program? Thanks & Regards. —Roland Y.

2. Before I started my travel agency I created a few Facebook groups to get the ball rolling. I have 5 groups currently all specific to Royal Caribbean and their ships. Combined they have over 120k members and growing daily. It's a fantastic source for leads.

This is where my question comes in.

They are all public groups and in the rules it states "Pirates be Gone" no selling or promoting business within the groups. I have many many travel agents doing whatever they can to get leads from the groups. I have had to remove members, ban members for just doing their jobs as travel agents. Some are vultures and it's ridiculous.

How do I handle this? I do not want to remove anyone, we all learn from these groups, we all make connections but I also put in 100s of hours creating content and managing these spaces to benefit my own agency.

Is there a happy medium? We are new to the travel industry and it really stinks watching others swoop in and take potential sales away. We have had some downright nasty messages come through because of this, but we have also had some very nice messages with people willing to help.

Any feedback you can provide would be great. Thank you for all of the incredible information you have provided, it has been invaluable.

Thank you, Travis

RESOURCES:

• (HAR’s 7 Day Setup Accelerator course on starting your agency)
• (What is an IATA number?)
• (What travel agent certification is and isn’t. Plus, what are the certifications out there for agents?)
• (A list of the different travel agent accreditation options.)
• (What is an ARC number?)
• (How to build a client base and find leads)
• (Promoting your travel agency on social media with these tools)
• (Travel Planners International’s profile on HAR)
• (Submit questions, sign up for reminders for the F15, along with that week's questions we'll be covering!)