Agents finding it harder to justify school holiday price hikes
Agents on the front line are increasingly struggling to close sales on family holidays due to the massive hike in prices during the school holidays.
Global Travel Group MD Andy Stark said agents had complained that it was getting more difficult to justify the disparity in prices for the same holiday just a week apart.
"While I’m not saying everybody’s being greedy, I do think it’s become open to some profiteering," he said.
"Now I’m speaking with a tour operator background, but I do think it’s time to re-balance."
Stark said the price hikes were more dramatic in the UK than in other European markets, such as France and Germany.
He believes the industry needs to work together to negotiate with hoteliers to level out the prices and to force the supply chain.
But he admitted that with certain destinations currently off limits or out of favour, suppliers in some countries were taking advantage of high demand.
"I hope it will settle down a bit, but at the moment our agents are telling us they’re finding it difficult to close a sale when the price is so different with a few weeks. We need to see the hike more from the consumer’s point of view."
Speaking to TravelMole at this week’s Global Travel Group conference in La Manga, Stark said Spain is having a really good year and Croatia, Italy, and France were also selling well.
"We’re also seeing some really competitive pricing on scheduled flights to long-haul destinations in Asia and to Dubai due to competition on the routes and the size of the fleets," he added.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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