TA Commission

[JayhawkFans]

*** Wow .. so based on the responses to my initial post .. I can estimate that my agent was going to make less than $200 in commission. Which in my opinion is not enough for him to have treated me like he did for cancelling. I ended up cancelling and then later rebooking with another agent who was going to honor the onboard credit that VISA offered (which he claims was not available) and also added in additional onboard credit. Let's face it .. cruising is expensive enough and every incentive helps. I totally understand if he would have put in hours or even minutes researching things for me but I went to him with the exact cruise; exact cabin; etc. I didn't have any questions other than what price can you offer.

I know for future reference who to book with and who to stay away from ***



I know it is impossible to find out exactly how much but I'm looking for a ballpark figure as to how much a TA might make in commission on a 3 night Dream cruise. The total cruise fare was $1,695.

The TA is an independent agent who books (I'm guessing) less than 20 Disney cruises per year.

 

[MillauFr]

I would guess they get 10% of the fare from Disney. I guess the question I have is why does Disney or any of the other cruise lines give any commission? The airlines have eliminated the commissions and seem to be doing fine.

 

[Chilly]

It depends also if you book direct with the TA or if you book wth Disney and then transfer it to the TA as they get less commission then.

 

[clten]

Standard commission is 10% of the base fare. So for your fare of $1695, you have to remove the taxes, port charges and the mysterious "non-commissionables". My guess is your agent is earning about $120-$130 for your booking.

For the PP the reason cruiselines continue to pay commissions is that TA provide a service for them. For airlines, it became a "I want to fly to this city and this date", not a lot of questions to be answered and a service that could be provided by a low overhead online system. So the airlines found a source that they could discontinue without it hurting their business in the long run.

With cruising, there are so many options about what cruiseline to use and what itinerary to sail that people still go to TA to get this advice. (If you aren't one of them, that's fine but then why are you concerned that cruiselines are compensating for the services they get?) When a TA is used and places customers with a cruiseline, they have saved the cruiseline time that their own employees may have been spending trying to close the deal. So they have provided the cruiseline a valuable service and deserve to be compensated for it. A cruiseline earns money on every booking that a TA places with them (if the customer ends up cancelling, the cruiseline doesn't pay the commission); if their employees that they have to pay a salary, benefits and overhead for had to handle all the inquiries, their close ratio would be nowhere near that!

 

[JayhawkFans]

We had booked only with the TA .. we had not booked with Disney and then transferred

 

[brios86]

10% of the fare. Since they are an independent agent I would think that they do not get to keep all of that. Their host agency keeps a part of it for overhead.

 

[wdwjeffc37]

Yep. 10% of the commisionable charges. There are numerous thing in a booking that commision is not paid on. As the PP said, certain taxes, port charges, "mysterious" others. But, 10% is pretty standard.

 

[TheRatPack]

I've gotten 2 quotes so far for our Cruise and while I realize that Disney Parks released Fall Free dining yesterday and TAs are probably covered up with that......I guess I was just expecting to be booking my cruise by now. Not waiting for responses . I'm so impatient when it comes to things of this nature.....I would LOVE to get the OBC and help of booking with a knowledgeable Disney TA, but at the same time I'd like to be booked and have that off my 'to do' list LOL.

As far as OBC/Commissions......both of the quotes we've received seem to be giving us 5% of our trip as an incentive OBC for booking with them. That would mean that if they get 10%.....we're getting 1/2 of that back. Our preferred category cost a bit more but I could see how many different bookings a TA would have to juggle to make a decent monthly income. Especially if they are working under a larger TA and they don't get the full commission. I guess many of them do this as a part time job and don't rely on it as a single source of income, those that do probably do get a bit irritated at cancelled reservations .

 

[lbgraves]

It depends also if you book direct with the TA or if you book wth Disney and then transfer it to the TA as they get less commission then.

Even transferred reservations get the standard 10% for the agency. Now, if a company does a large amount of business with a cruise line, they receive up to around 15% for new bookings but the standard 10% for transferred bookings. The agent receives a portion of that commission. Unfortunately, some agencies don't pay their agents anything for a transferred booking because they don't view it the same as a new one. I think that is horrible since the agent could end up doing the same amount of work for a transfer.

 

[Bear3412]

Wow. An unfortunate difficult discussion about $ and commissions during a process that always excites "us". And during an experience that should be filled with personal excitement too. When booking, and anticipating a cruise, only excitement and exhilaration should exists.

Besides the paranoia of how to pay for it. lol.

Usually the cruise booking process for us, whether, online/phone, is like winning the lottery. Lol. Once booked it is real, it is now permanent plans, and is "on" the calender. It is fixed/scheduled fun/euphoria etc. in the future.

I'm sorry you had a different experience. I hope it all works out for you.
If not PM me. Seriously.

I hope it all works out for you.

 

[bumbershoot]

I've gotten 2 quotes so far for our Cruise and while I realize that Disney Parks released Fall Free dining yesterday and TAs are probably covered up with that......I guess I was just expecting to be booking my cruise by now. Not waiting for responses . I'm so impatient when it comes to things of this nature.....I would LOVE to get the OBC and help of booking with a knowledgeable Disney TA, but at the same time I'd like to be booked and have that off my 'to do' list LOL.

It's why I ended up booking through costcotravel.com for our semi-last-minute cruise (aka "the one we didn't plan a whole year for"). I went onto their site, signed in, and booked the cruise. EASY. I didn't have to request quotes or any nonsense like that. And I'll get a faboo $120 Costco giftcard when we get back (vs $50 OBC for the same cruise on a "request a quote" TA site)

Then when I realized they didn't have me scheduled to pay the balance until 2 days AFTER I could do online checkin, etc etc, I went onto their website, did a payment, and it went through immediately. I got the confirmation, I went straight to disneycruise.com, and it was THERE. So easy!



OP I'm glad you were able to cancel, and I'm sorry you had to do so. Hopefully you'll be able to give the TA some good feedback on how to do things and how NOT to do things. Hopefully he'll be able to hear it and either get better at communicating or perhaps change some things about how he works in the future.

 

[TheRatPack]

It's why I ended up booking through costcotravel.com for our semi-last-minute cruise (aka "the one we didn't plan a whole year for"). I went onto their site, signed in, and booked the cruise. EASY. I didn't have to request quotes or any nonsense like that. And I'll get a faboo $120 Costco giftcard when we get back (vs $50 OBC for the same cruise on a "request a quote" TA site)

I'm just about ready to go that route as well. With Costco Travel we get 150.00 more in gift cards than most TA sites show as OBC. I really would have loved to book with a TA that was excited to help us book, helped us learn what was a must do and what could be skipped for our first cruise but seriously I have a year to plan and these forums are great at answering questions. I just hate that a TA hasn't seemed eager to earn my business.....again I am trying to cut them a bit of slack due to FDing being released just impatient I guess.

 

[bumbershoot]

I'm just about ready to go that route as well. With Costco Travel we get 150.00 more in gift cards than most TA sites show as OBC. I really would have loved to book with a TA that was excited to help us book, helped us learn what was a must do and what could be skipped for our first cruise but seriously I have a year to plan and these forums are great at answering questions. I just hate that a TA hasn't seemed eager to earn my business.....again I am trying to cut them a bit of slack due to FDing being released just impatient I guess.

I just spoke with two costco travel people in the last hour, and they were excited and happy to help, and the first one is going on her first Disney cruise in November. The one gave me a new quote as I asked for and put notes of our conversation into my account, and the second one half hour later added DH (yay yay yay!) without any troubles (it required her calling DCL while I was on the line so it wasn't a short call, but it was trouble-free). She was willing to help in whatever way i needed.

All the other stuff...what can be skipped, etc, can be learned so much easier (IMO) on these boards than through a TA. Especially b/c of the boards you get 100 peoples' opinions instead of just one, know what I mean?

 

[mousefan5]

Op I saw that you commented about a visa onboard credit. I didn't realize that this expires in September and then no more onboard credit is given of you pay for your entire cruise with the disney visa. I found this out when my travel agent called disney but then checked it out on the visa site. This had nothing to do with my travel agent