Businessweek
The Travel Agent Is Back. Here’s How to Know if You Need One
Uncertainty in the friendly skies is fueling a run on a profession long thought departed.
Like most travel agents, Sarah Fazendin spent much of last year canceling trips for clients. The owner of Videre Travel, an agency in Denver that specializes in high-end family getaways, scrambled to secure refunds and credit vouchers and organize paperwork for travel insurance claims.
That wasn’t the worst of it. “When an airline refunded a client, they also recalled our commission,” she says. “So as I worked around the clock, I watched my revenue go from record-breaking to nonexistent.” Hers is a common story: Travel agents as a whole lost a combined $12.4 billion in 2020, according to research company Phocuswright.