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Let a keyboard or mouse be your travel accessories '. . . I feel more in control than going through an agent' Rosemary MacCracken CanWest News Service Sunday, August 21, 2005
The Internet is helping people like Mandy Moore realize their travel dreams. From the comfort of her home or office, she can check out the destinations she'd like to visit, find out what services and entertainment are available, and see what flights, hotels and car rentals cost. Moore, 31, takes five or six trips a year and always shops for travel online, comparing two or three providers. "I sit at a desk all day, so it's easy to click around and see what's available," she says. "And I feel more in control than going through an agent. I can see range of prices and other options." A 2004 study of online travel by TNS Canadian Facts says one in five travellers used agents to make their bookings, compared with 12 per cent who purchased from full-service travel websites. And those who use the Internet are not all enthusiastic about the experience. The study found 37 per cent were fully satisfied, 50 per cent were somewhat satisfied and 10 per cent were decidedly unimpressed. Walid Salem, director of customer relationship management at the Canadian Tourism Commission's e-marketing group, cites a recent report published by PhoCusWright Inc., which surveys online travellers in the "Online providers can clearly improve their footing with travellers," says Salem. The CTC is an Ottawa-based consortium of public- and private-sector tourism partners. The key to doing so, he adds, "may be selling multiple travel components -- such as flight, hotels, car and tours -- in one online package." He notes a 400-per-cent jump in online The full-service travel websites have been delivering travel packages since the mid-1990s, adding features and refinements over the years and Salem predicts the online arms of mainstream travel outfits will be following this model. Expedia.ca started serving the Canadian market in 1997, a year after Expedia.com, the mother company, was launched in the "We clearly indicate what hotels are child-friendly, and you can also search according to amenities," says Sean Shannon, Expedia.ca's Toronto-based managing director. "If you're going to Orlando and you've got to have a pool for the kids, the Wyndham Orlando Resort offers two children's pools, three outdoor splash pools, and shuttles to Universal Studios, SeaWorld and Wet 'n' Wild." Travel insurance can be added to an Expedia.ca package, as can transportation to and from the hotel. Sightseeing tours and entertainment can also be booked at many travel destination locations. Travellers to Dublin, "You can book all the components of your trip before you leave home," Shannon says, "and not waste precious travel time making decisions." U.S.-based Travelocity operates in a similar way. Flight/hotel packages can be created by keying in the departure city and destination, and hotel searches can be narrowed by clicking on desired amenities such as swimming pools or fitness centres. Last-minute deals are also flagged. But keep in mind that Travelocity prices are in U.S. dollars and some of its flight routes are not as direct as those offered by Canadian providers. Flights, hotels and insurance can be booked with Air The feature of shopping for flights on aircanada.com or destina.ca is that viewers see a grid listing the prices for a range of days around their departure and return dates. Viewers may see, for instance, that they will pay a lower fare if they return the day after their planned return date and can adjust their times accordingly.
"The web allows us to provide greater transparency to customers," says Laura Cook, Air Air Packaging now includes extended families living across the continent. Moore frequently vacations with relatives who live in the "Family vacation reunions, particularly to sun destinations, are a growing trend," notes Expedia.ca's Shannon. Visitors to Expedia can set up mock itineraries and e-mail them to others; when a group agrees on the details of a trip, flights and rooms can be booked individually or by one person. Air Most online travel sites encourage customers to create user profiles -- with information such as destination preferences and meal requests voluntarily provided by the customer. This allows providers to send out customized e-mail about offers that might appeal to these individuals. There's a big rush in the travel industry to create customer loyalty in this way, Salem says. "The technology is certainly there, but so far the industry hasn't gone as far with this as the online bookstores have." Consumers can expect to see more of this customized marketing in the future. Shannon says Expedia is developing ways to offer its customers greater "personalization." Map it out Most online travel providers provide maps of the areas in which their properties are located. Call up any hotel offered by Expedia.ca or Destina.ca and you'll be offered a map of its sounding area; if it's in a city, a map of the surrounding neighbourhood will be shown. Travelocity's properties also come with maps and directions from major airports. Travellers who want to check out areas away from their hotels, however, will generally have to do their own research but there is online assistance. Visitors to MultiMap ( www.multimap.com) can look at a continent, a country or a city, then zoom down to a specific intersection. The site also allows visitors to book hotels within blocks of a refined search, and provides door-to-door travel directions. Need to find out what languages are spoken in WorldAtlas ( www.worldatlas.com) offers an archive of printable city maps from around the world. Dot travel As of Dec. 1, consumers will see changes in the web addresses of many businesses, organizations and professionals in the global travel industry. Many domain names will end with the ".travel" extension (as in xyztours.travel). The Travel Partnership Corp. a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit international consortium of travel industry members, is the sponsor of dot.travel and its goal is to develop and enforce standards for .travel members worldwide. Candidates for dot.travel domain names will have to display acceptable business practice standards. This will help ensure consumers that these are legitimate travel businesses and organizations, says Susan Wong, the Tourism Industry Association of Canada's communications manager in Ottawa. "Right now, you don't really know what you're getting with an online travel company." "It would provide branding and context to an URL," the CTC's Salem says. "Consumers will know from the dot.travel extension that a firm is a travel business. But will it assure the authenticity of a business? That depends on just how it is regulated." Expedia.ca's Shannon says his company and its sister firms around the world will not be moving to a .travel domain name. "It may have some relevance for the broader industry," he says, "but it doesn't suit our model. We are set up by country with the .ca extension in SITES TO CHECK OUT Canadians interested in exploring their own country can research Canadian destinations at user-friendly online visitor centres. Links to provincial/territorial tourist associations and bureaus can be found at www.tiac-aitc.ca/english/usefullinks.asp. And the Tourism Industry Association of Canada's site at www.tiac-aitc.ca/english/CACVB_members.asp provides links to regional/city tourism bureaus. For more on travel in Travel_Leisure/Travel_Agencies_Services/ The Last Minute Club: www.lastminute.com Club Med: www.clubmedvacations.ca For hotel reservations: www.hotelscentral.com For discount travel and more, www.canadaretail.ca/Travelguide2.html © The Vancouver Province 2005 |
