By: David J. Wardell

© 1998 By: David J. Wardell.  Reproduction or redistribution in any form without written permission is strictly prohibited.

Reflecting upon these and other notions more current in society will illustrate that conspiracies are everywhere and have been for hundreds of years. It seems part of human nature to believe that the evil whomever is behind strange coincidences and events that appear to benefit individuals or special groups.

The travel business has plenty of conspiracies. The big one 20 years ago was that the CRS was a plot so that airlines could make agents do all their work. That was followed by the evil data conspiracy, wherein airlines, backoffice suppliers, and just about everyone else was struggling to get their hands on a travel agent's data so that unpleasant things could be done with it.

The problem was that few stopped to ask what those unpleasant things might be or why agents should fear them. Moreover, just a little thought should have convinced people that most agent's data are in such chaos that any effort to use it for nefarious purposes would be disproportionate to the effort. The data conspiracy is still with us from time to time.

Other travel conspiracies surround electronic ticketing. There have been discussions on TWX about e-tickets and their impact upon agencies, but perhaps a bit more space discussing the value and purpose of the article itself is in order.

People occasionally assert that e-tickets are either useless, consumer unfriendly or a plot by airlines to enable direct selling and bypass agents. Again, the conspiracy folks fail to step back and focus on the issue.

Airline tickets have not changed appreciably in 60 years. It is downright foolish to maintain an expensive infrastructure built around issuing little scraps of paper that people are paid to rip, sort, and shuffle. At it's most ludicrous, travelers arriving at the airport stand in line and wait while these scraps of paper are diligently written out so that they can walk a few hundred feet and surrender those same scraps to employees of the same airline that wrote them out moments before. In fact, one of the key reasons why people must arrive at the airport an hour before their flights is so that five different people can stare at those scraps of paper otherwise called tickets.

Agents spend millions in courier fees, delivery fees, and processing costs shuffling tickets between themselves and their customers, and among their various branches. Technology has advanced to the point where, for many types of travel, tickets no longer serve any purpose.

But doesn't the absence of tickets lessen the agent's value and make bypass practical? Although I'll answer the question in a moment, I'd suggest that this question doesn't make any difference. No amount of wishing for bygone days where e-tickets were only a dream will make it so. Nor will sorrow over any damage to the agent's role change the costs and inefficiencies associated with ticketing. The world has moved on and the travel industry must as well.

This doesn't mean that the confusing and inconvenient thing most airlines call electronic ticketing is the answer--far from it. Given the interline, refund, and reliability problems many people (myself included) avoid e-tickets for some trips. The current process has successfully traded complex scraps of paper (tickets) for simpler scraps (boarding passes), but is usually not paperless and has serious infrastructure problems.

None of that will bring the old days back. It does mean that more changes are inevitable.

Now to the question about the agent's role: If there is a single lesson electronic ticketing or electronic booking has to teach it is that people building businesses around moving scraps of paper are at risk unless they are adding real (as opposed to perceived or temporary) value. No conspiracy is needed to understand that lesson.