The e-Doc Is In
How are customer service-oriented agents dealing with recent and upcoming changes involving trip documentation, a basic component of the retailer/customer interaction?
Agents pointed out that demographics come into play here. The affluent and senior market are more likely to expect the traditional high end luggage tags and the like whereas the generation x’ers have no problem printing out e-docs. But at all ends of the market there is change in the role of the agent.
Here are three viewpoints.
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“Back in the old days, we used to send out documents via FedEx carefully and beautifully packaged in a velour photo album,” Tony Adler of Cruise & Resort, an upscale agency based in California. “The costs became prohibitive, and the perceived value by the clients also diminished over time. Getting documents fast became more important than the packaging.”
He noted that electronic docs are accepted cheerfully by most. “A few of our older clients will still ask Kristy [Adler] to deal with the computer stuff,” he said. “When she needs to print them for a client, she will either fax or mail the documents. This is not something that happens very often. Many clients do, however, initiate a phone conversation to make sure they have downloaded and printed everything properly. Our “presentation” and agency branding is now more related to our knowledge and willingness to help our clients. Times have changed!”
That being said, the Adlers do still send out documents for some of the more expensive cruises and for tours from Classic Vacations, safaris, etc. “It is a costly and time-consuming process which seems to make much less of an impression than a call to make sure the clients are excited about their trip,” observed Adler.
Like Adler, Eric Ardolino, A & S Travel Services, Wallingford, CT, said there are good and bad sides to the movement toward e-docs.
“If you have the ability to e-mail documents to groups, especially groups that are repeaters and know the game, it’s actually a money-saver,” he said.
“On the other hand,” he noted, “for the person who wants to do a cruise and wants to go over everything, we have to print 27-28 pages of e-docs.”
Ardolino’s agency is adjusting. “Does it cost us extra money sometimes to print them? No question,” answered Ardolino. “I wouldn’t have invested in a new laser printer if it didn’t… it’s laser color and works faster.”
And, he pointed out, it costs money to put docs in an envelope and mail them out at a minimum of 42 cents apiece.
While agents said that in order to save money they only print the relevant pages, Ardolino’s view is that’s not properly protecting yourself or the customer. Nevertheless, he concurred that some aspects of e-docs seem wasteful.
“As one example, if a customer is required to register online, why do the e-docs have the registration papers in there again?” he asked.
Clients Like e-Efficiency
Many of the issues are customer-related, not supplier driven. “The ones who want to come in and go over stuff, don’t like the new way,” he said. “But when they book and I tell them I can have your e-docs completed here in less than three hours, that to me is pretty efficient.”
He said he loves the idea of more tour operators using e-docs, since tour documentation usually involves only a couple pieces of paper.
“What’s not to like about it? With some, as soon as you full pay, within 30 seconds I have an e-mail with vouchers. We don’t give away tote bags with the documents anymore. It’s too expensive for us, and customers no longer care about what the voucher looks like or the packets,” he said.
What’s more important now for some customers is the ability to get everything from the agent without having to make another trip to the office.
“Still,” said Ardolino, “the majority of my people come and get e-docs, so we go over everything. Or we e-mail it to them, remind them of their passports and say, ‘Come in if you have any questions and want to go over them.’”
Key in this area, said Ardolino, is to do everything as efficiently and electronically as possible: “If we didn’t, we couldn’t survive in this business.”
Printing and Branding
JT Trotta of New York-based Prime Time Travel observed: “In the old days, we had someone in our office doc department go through everything with a fine tooth comb to make sure everything was proper. We never allowed anything to be mailed directly to a client. Now almost everything is electronic or turning electronic — tour operators are still mainly paper, but that will change.”
So with tour operators, Prime Time still checks and reviews for accuracy, he said.
“We then send out our own package to the customer, as it shows we want to work for the client, to service the client,” said Trotta. “We include our own gifts to go out with the documentation: bags, printed with our logo and information.”
When electronic documents come in, how his agency proceeds depends on the both the customer and cruise line. “For some we will pre-register, print out a package and send it to them,” explained Trotta.
“For customers able to do it themselves, we provide them the electronic document via e-mail with a detailed e-mail explaining how to do it. We like it if customers can do it themselves; we’re finding a lot of clients doing it well, but with a large group over a certain age bracket, we’re doing it as a service,” he said.
Trotta said that since more than 88% of people access to computers, you would think only a small minority would have difficulty with e-docs. But, said Trotta, the reality is different.
“Some clients just can’t handle this,” he reported. “Our customers call in time and time again after being initially confident they can handle it.”
With many preferred suppliers, though, it’s still paper, he noted. “If it’s an all-inclusive land to, say, Italy, we still give the customers their vouchers,” said Trotta. “And on cruises longer than seven days, people still come in and go over the documents day by day, visas come into play, and so forth. Overall, documentation is still a huge undertaking for an agency our size.”
And that’s not a bad thing, because in many aspects the detailed manner in which agencies such as Prime Time Travel package documents is not only to provide customer service, but to function as a visible reminder of the agency’s brand name when the customer travels.
In Trotta’s view: “To be honest, these changes are hurting agencies. In the old days we would have a paper document, so it was a physical piece of something we’re giving the client that they bought from us. Now, it’s hard for us to provide something for them.”
Even though the cruise lines want theirs used for identification purposes, Trotta said, “We have purchased our own bag tags branded for our own company.”
