Fees are a perennial hot topic among the travel agency community. On the season four opener of Trade Secrets, co-hosts Emma Weissmann and Jamie Biesiada delve into many different aspects of planning fees with Tiffany Hines, CEO and president of Global Escapes, and Cali Stein, a luxury advisor with Embark Beyond. They address normalizing fees, different ways to charge, whether every client should be charged the same way and more.

In this episode:

8:22 - An overview on fee data from Travel Weekly’s survey

9:39 - How Cali and Tiffany charge fees

15:43 - How do agents normalize charging a fee for their services, both among clients and other advisors?

22:55 - What’s the right planning fee for a new travel advisor?

27:06 - How do you charge a fee for your services? How do you introduce the idea of a fee to clients?

29:32 - How do you handle charging fees for different kinds of clients, like referrals, for instance?

35:06 - Should booking fees be the same for every client?

36:10 - Are celebrity clients in a different tier than others?

38:40 - One advisor isn’t getting any takers with her fee – what gives?

44:57 - How do you actually collect and process fees from clients?

47:26 – How do you keep track of time if you’re charging an hourly fee?

This episode was sponsored by Windstar Cruises. https://www.windstarcruises.com/

Further resources:

Cali Stein: cali@embarkbeyond.com and Embark Beyond 

Tiffany Hines: tiffany@globalescapes.com or 706-548-4807 and Global Escapes 

Travel Consulting Associates, Tiffany’s consultancy, and a free guide to charging fees

Trade Secrets season 2 podcast on fees 

The Last Resort podcast 

Humans of Travel podcast 

Travel Weekly’s fee survey

The American Society of Travel Advisors' credo

The Folo episode on fees 

Thanks to our friends at Montecito Village Travel for helping us source questions for this season!

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Email us: tradesecrets@travelweekly.com

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