Question:

Has anyone taken their travel agent in-house and if so how is it working out, is it saving significant dollars etc?
-Todd Stansbury, Oregon State University

Responses:

We do not have an in-house travel agent.
- Sheila Berg, Northern Illinois University

Vanderbilt currently contracts with a private company to provide our travel needs. We have done some preliminary evaluation of the pros/cons of going in-house and right now, believe our needs are better met with an experienced travel professional. The cost would likely be neutral or slightly less in real dollars, but the disruption in service would be a tremendous cost to the athletics program. Hope this helps.
-Beth Baldwin, Vanderbilt University

We used a local travel agent last year after cutting a marketing deal with them but it was not a good fit. They just did not understand the needs of an athletic department. All our sports secure their own travel arrangements.
- Darrell Horn, Western Kentucky University

Todd, at Purdue we contract with Anthony Travel out of South Bend, IN as our in-house travel agent. I agree with Elizabeth at Vanderbilt. It's difficult to evaluate the savings, but, in our opinion, the service and control is what you are really after.

Savings are always calculated by comparing actual ticket cost with published rates (because that's all they have to work with), but, the reality is that we probably wouldn't have paid published rates even if we were arranging the travel on our own. So, what was the true savings? Hard to know. It's hard to imagine that we're paying more for tickets by using an outside travel agency, plus we do get free tickets based on volume. The real value is service. A true travel agency, especially one that specializes in sports team travel, can make arrangements with air carriers and hotels that provide the flexibility needed by teams, e.g. last minute name changes, etc. We also utilize our in-house agents to assure that our staff are following our travel policies, e.g. not sneaking in upgrades, etc. They can make sure we have control at the front-end.
- Glenn Tompkins, Purdue University

We did a cost study and decided not to take our travel in house. We did switch to National Travel Service for 24 hour service.
- Kevin Hurley, Texas A&M University

Saint Louis University does not have an in house travel agent. We utilize a local travel agency that charges us a $25 per ticket transaction agency fee. This ends up being around $30,000 annually spread out throughout the department. Most of the time we are able to find the same flights on-line for the same price, but then have to pay the agency fees. The only advantage of an agency is in utilizing group contracts. We receive a 10% discount when booking at least 90 days in advance. An in house travel agent makes sense if you can get someone that knows what they are doing and you can establish the same contacts with the airlines. Good Luck. - Mark Spencer, St. Louis University

At the University of Missouri-Kansas City, we previously used a local travel agency. This was a great deal until they started charging us $35.00 per ticket transaction agency fee. Now, we have a coach designated from each sport that deals with the travel/airlines. They still have to run everything thru me for control before final booking, but we have been able to get better deals making the arrangements ourselves. We have still been able to get group discounts with Southwest (10%). Also, the airlines that charge agency fees (American is one), charge us $5.00, instead of the $35.00 we were paying.
Hope this helps!
- Carla Wilson, University of Missouri-Kansas City