21 Augustus 2008
Professionals, tired of telephone operators and booking online, want freedom of choice, attention, and flexibility.
 Bert Koopman
Amsterdam
Why doesn’t anybody listen to the client? A question keeps occupying Daniel Lenderink (37), who has many years of working experience in the travel business. In 2000 he started Schiphol Travel and made a few themes central: personal attention to the business traveler, flexibility and sharply priced tickets.
Lenderink says “Business travelers – or better yet, the secretaries who book their business trips – have had more than enough of the impersonal call centers. They no longer want to be regarded as a profile on the computer screen.”
Large travel agents, in general, use call centers as their primary method of communication with the client. But to be confronted with long waiting periods and then to be transferred endlessly, on your own expense, results in incomprehension and irritation.
Schiphol Travel, which realizes a yearly growth of 30%, is not the only organization that concentrates its efforts on personal attention in guiding clients. Other top ten players, such as Uniglobe and VCK Travel, also follow this route.
“Uniglobe purposely has no call center,” says director Cees Klinkenberg. “The website serves as a showcase. Personal contact between the travel specialist and client is central in our 26 local offices. We focus on SMEs. Our franchise enterprises speak the same language and understand the travel needs of our target clients.
Also VCK Travel avoids call centers according to marketing coordinator Claudia op den Velde. “Every business that books with us gets a specific team assigned to them.”
Trendsetter Schiphol Travel (45 employees, Euro 50 million turnover) works with experienced permanent personnel. The employees know their way around the amazing world of airline alliances, reservation systems and rate structures. They assist business travelers from planning to expensing their business trips.
Lenderink: “We are one of the fastest growing business travel organizations in the market.” According to Lenderink, personal attention for business travelers also means that he can hold flights in option, for a few days, but sometimes for a week or a month. “This is how you build maximum flexibility for the traveler – a real difference from online booking.”
On the basis of his business pillars of personal attention, flexibility and ‘smart ticketing’, Lenderink claims to offer price advantages which on intercontinental flights can amount to up to Euro 1500 per business trip. This is possible because the account manager knows the client very well, and therefore, for example, knows that the traveler going on a business trip to Copenhagen, also flies to Washington every month. The more you travel, the more combinations are available that can save money. “With the speedy, impersonal approach of a call center, this can never happen.
The handling fees that Lenderink charges are higher than those of his competitors who go for online solutions, but due to his sharp price discounts, he claims to be cheaper. This savings will be noticeable with a yearly travel budget of Euro25.000.
Lenderink sees many business travel purchase officers swimming into fee traps. “Purchase officers can be driven by their bonus, staring blankly in the differences of handling fees, thinking they can save large amounts of money by choosing the cheapest handling fees. Often purchase officers choose online products for which handling fees can be considerably lowered, as the client, needs to fill in all sorts of information themselves. But they do not look at the often much more expensive ticket prices, while those are the budgetary assassins.”
Schiphol Travel has 400 steady clients. These are large to mid-sized companies. Within 2 to 3 years, Lenderink wants to grow to 1000 clients. By then, turnover should be doubled to Euro 100 million.
He sees two developments that worry him. More and more companies are booking their trips online. He has hope for the future though, as in the United States the business travel online bookings are declining for the first time in history.
Also, he sees airline tickets reducing in price, but taxes in the Netherlands are going up. Due to government policy, Schiphol Airport is becoming less interesting. On a round trip ticket to America, a non specified amount of Euro 200 to 250 tax is added. ” This fall, the taxes will be raised again. It is becoming more and more attractive to depart from Dusseldorf.”
Anonymous, impersonal, long waiting periods, wrongly transferred, relate the whole story again, increasing costs - not only in the business travel branch, but also with the private traveler, call centers have a negative image. Private individuals also need personal attention and flexibility.
Cees Klinkenberg – from Uniglobe: “Clients from both groups prefer personal advice, especially when the trip is complicated.”
Claudia op den Velde – from VCK: “Besides business travel, we also organize cruise vacations for private clients. These are complex products for which personal attention is essential.”
Also Daniel Lenderink – from Schiphol Travel – sees the trend, but has a reservation. “Travel patterns of business and private people are two different categories. Differences are travel frequencies and destinations. Besides, the business segment is less price sensitive than the private segment.”
Finally, there are different booking patterns. Private people order flight tickets and hotel arrangements separately and mostly online. On the other hand, all-inclusive arranged vacation trips are booked by phone or at the travel bureau around the corner.
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