Grateful Clients: How One Personal Travel Manager Went Above & Beyond

When Personal Travel Manager Amanda Brady learned that her clients had unexpectedly found themselves in danger of being stranded in Italy she worked around the clock to bring them home.

Amanda Brady, who is TravelManagers’ representative for Wellington Point Queensland has some very grateful clients after she was able to get them home safely from the unprecedented situation in Italy.

As the COVID-19 situation rapidly unfolded, her clients suddenly found themselves at risk of being stranded in northern Italy.

Now safely at home in Queensland, they have reached out to thank her for her long hours and hard work in getting them onto a homeward flight.

“Whilst Italy was in the very early stages of the outbreak when my clients were due to depart for Italy, they had received reassuring information from family in Turin,” Amanda explained.

“Their main destination was a smaller community in northern Italy, so after discussing the options to cancel or change their flights and recommending that they seek advice from their GP, they chose to proceed with their trip. None of us expected at that stage that things would escalate so quickly!”

According to Amanda, it was the Singapore government’s decision to close its borders to foreign travellers who had been in northern Italy during the previous fourteen days that precipitated the need to bring her clients home as soon as possible.

“I reached out to my clients with the recommendation that they leave northern Italy earlier than originally planned and outlined three courses of action (plus their possible consequences) so that they could make an informed decision,” she said.

The clients opted to head south and spend the rest of their time in Italy exploring Tuscany and Umbria, but two days later they received a 2am phone call advising that all borders were closing, and their flight home in two weeks’ time was looking increasingly uncertain.

An urgent phone call ensued, and within 45 minutes an alternative flight home from Rome that same evening had been confirmed on a different airline.

With roads closing and the entire country swiftly moving into total lockdown, her clients made a four-hour dash to the airport where they had an anxious wait to board their flight.

By the time they departed, about 60 per cent of flights had been cancelled.

“Amanda was our guardian angel and we thank her from the bottom of our hearts. She went above and beyond to help us in a time of significant crisis and was looking out for us all along the trip”.

Amanda’s clients

“With her help we escaped an unprecedented global crisis in the nick of time, and we will be using her for all of our future travel plans when normal life resumes.”

Amanda said her previous experience with major travel industry crises has helped her to deal with the COVID-19 crisis, and although her income has effectively dried up overnight, her focus has once again been on providing as much assistance as possible to her clients.

That assistance has been reciprocated by her clients: Amanda reports that she has received numerous calls, emails, messages and even gifts from long-standing clients who know how hard she has been working for no financial
reward.

Amanda said the PTM network has also been a valuable source of support and notes that she and her colleagues are continuing to work together to get through this challenging time.

“I am a big believer in teamwork – together we have such a wonderful knowledge base and we are also there for each other’s emotional support,” she said.

“As our work has slowed down, I’ve made an effort to connect with fellow PTMs and ensure that we’re all getting the emotional support we need right
now. Without this amazing support right now, I’d feel alone, but I am far from alone with my wonderful TravelManagers family.”