It’s Tuesday, and that means it’s time for another episode of Travel Agent to the Rescue. This week we speak to Peter Fiske from Clayfield Travel who helped his clients during Hurricane Katrina and on 9/11.
Peter has been in the industry for over 35 years, and his story today highlights the ability of travel agents to be there when you really need them…
Without further ado, let’s get to it…
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In August 2005, when Hurricane Katrina was bearing down on New Orleans, I had a client just getting off a cruise in Miami who was flying to New Orleans the next day.
However, Katrina was due to hit New Orleans the next day so the whole city had shut down with no flights in or out.
I didn’t wait for him to call me. Instead, I called him at his hotel that evening. He told me how he had spent the whole day trying to call United with no luck, and how local travel agents couldn’t help him as they already had their hands full.
I said OK, and asked him if he wanted to go to Las Vegas instead, to which he said “great!”
As I had control of his flight and hotel bookings, I made the changes (United and the New Orleans hotel waived charges).
I called him back an hour later with his new travel details, and he was very happy and very appreciative.
Try doing that on the Internet!
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In 2001 when the 9/11 attacks occurred, I had two clients in Toronto who were scheduled to fly to New York that day.
When air space all over the country was shut down, my client called me.
They were seasoned travelers and still wanted to go to New York so I quickly got on to Amtrak and booked them two seats.
They arrived into New York a day later and were able to resume their itinerary as originally planned.
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Thanks for that Peter.
Peter’s stories highlight the important role that travel agents can play in emergency situations. With control of flight bookings in his GDS, there was no need to call the airline as he could do everything necessary from his end.
Have you read Peter Fiske’s Agent Insights story yet?