If you need a pro

Question: Your March 8 “On the Spot” column mentioned using “a cruise-connected travel agent” to get preferential cruise deals. That sounds good, but travel articles never seem to tell how to find agents who legitimately fit this category, rather than just any old travel agent who might make such claims. How do we do this?

Richard L. James

Marina del Rey

Answer: In today’s info-intensive world, you can find ratings of hotels (TripAdvisor), plumbers and electricians and other home repair specialists (Angie’s List), and restaurants (Zagat), but finding a great travel agent requires a personal connection because it’s really all about the relationship.

You can do without a travel agent for simple things -- an airline ticket or a hotel -- but for more complex trips, he or she can be a strong ally. Choose the wrong one and he or she can suck the air and light out of your vacation.

Here’s what Arthur Frommer, the dean of travelers, says in his new book, “Ask Arthur Frommer: And Travel Better, Cheaper, Smarter”: “The smart consumer adopts the same precautions in choosing a travel agent that they would use in choosing any professional: They seek references.”

In an e-mail to me last week, he elaborated: “There simply is no substitute for asking friends and acquaintances if they’re familiar with a doctor, dentist, lawyer or accountant for a particular need, which is the only way we have of finding a (hopefully) accomplished person. . . . I also suggest to people choosing a travel agent that they ‘cross-examine’ that person closely to learn their qualifications. Have the agents themselves been to the destination you are considering?

“Have they themselves been to, or seen, the hotels they are recommending -- or have they simply chosen those establishments from a booklet or other list? Can they provide you with the names of persons who have used them for similar services?

“In other words, can they provide references? If the agent is unable to cite such qualifications, I would not use them.

“Because travel agents no longer receive a commission from the airlines and must therefore charge extra fees for their services, it costs more to use a travel agent than to make the arrangements yourself. Therefore, why use one unless that person is producing added value?”

Millie Ball, the longtime travel editor of the Times-Picayune in New Orleans, found an agent who provided that added value -- and then some. She recalled wanting to stay at the Moana Surfrider in Waikiki when a 35% discount was offered. The offer was limited, so her agent called the hotel every day for two weeks until he got her the discount rate.

That was just one of the many ways he looked out for her -- not because she was a newspaper person but because he was a great agent.

He even named his dog after her, and when he died, Ball inherited the pooch. Milliedog is thought to be about 15.

Dogs may be man’s best friend, but a good travel agent ranks right up there.

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