Riviera Travel Now Offering Travel Agents a ‘Lifetime Commission’

Travel agents booking a sailing with the U.K.’s “Travel Brand of the Year,” Riviera Travel, will now be able to enjoy a long-lasting benefit of booking with the river cruise line.

“Any agent booking clients on our river cruises will benefit from lifetime commissions—that’s a promise,” Riviera CEO David Clemson said.

Riviera Travel announced this month the launch of its “lifetime commission” incentive: once an agent has booked a client with Riviera, each subsequent booking made by that client will earn the agent commission, no matter how far into the future the booking is made.

“If a client books another cruise directly through us, we guarantee a commission will be paid to the travel agent who made their initial booking,” Clemson said.

As long as an agent’s client doesn’t register through another agent with a different IATA or CLIA number, then the benefit will continue.

“We enjoy the highest levels of repeat business and we want our travel agent partners to benefit from that, too,” Clemson said.

Riviera entered the U.S. market earlier this year when it officially opened an American call center and launched a U.S. website in April. At the time, Clemson told Travel Market Report that it wasn’t just the brand’s hardware that is expected to attract attention, but also its agent policies.

“We’ve never discounted in our 33 years and we have no plans to start. Our customers absolutely love it, and we’re seeing the agents here in the U.S. like it as well,” Clemson said.

The brand, which got its start as a land tour operator, launched its first river cruise product in 2009. Eight years later, Riviera sports 12 ships, five of them launched in just the past 15 months.  

Commissions start at a 12 percent base but can grow to 14 percent for agents who complete Riviera’s training program. Riviera also is offering anyone who registers a chance to win a free cruise for 2018.