The short answer to this article’s title question is: It probably won’t affect you.
The longer answer is all about why that’s the case.
Going back a step: By now, you’ll likely have seen images of some disruption at UK airports, as the British public release their pent-up demand for holidays.
While any cancelled holiday causes understandable frustration for the passengers, as a potential travel professional it’s important to understand the wider story.
Here are 3 key takeaways to think about.
1/ The disruption isn’t as bad as you might think
One of the largest reasons for the disruption is actually a positive (albeit in disguise).
Namely, the demand for holidays is massive and breaking records.
This means you’ll be coming into an industry that’s back & booming – with more potential than ever to build a great home-based business.
Currently this overwhelming holiday demand is outpacing staffing numbers at airlines and airports. These staff numbers are now gradually returning to their required levels, as more people are recruited and trained.
But also be aware that reporting can make things appear more severe than they actually are.
Did you know that, according to aviation data specialists Cirium, a maximum of 5.7% of flights were cancelled at the peak of the issue? By Monday April 18th, this was back down to 0.7%.
And the UK government has just this week announced an amnesty on ‘airport slots rules’ for summer ‘22.
It means airlines – instead of having to hold onto departure slots they can’t fill – will be able to let airports re-allocate them to other airlines on a short term basis.
According to Abta, the net effect of this should decrease potential cancellations this summer.
“Allowing additional flexibility around airport slots will help minimise these late cancellations meaning, if necessary, any changes can be made in advance and our travel agent and tour operator members can support customers to make alternative arrangements.”
Luke Petherbridge, Abta director of public affairs
2/ Your bookings are likely to avoid the issue all together
If you decide to start your franchise today, the next induction weeks you can join will be July or August.
We want you to start your business quickly and make bookings from day one if possible. However, it’s important to note that those bookings won’t all be for short-term travel.
So, by the time your business is up and running, you’ll mostly be making bookings for autumn/winter 22/23 and summer 23 or beyond – when things should be back to normal.
Of course, you’ll also be shown how to find customers looking for a quick summer getaway during your training, so that you can get your business off to a fast start.
And our marketing team will provide you with offers that you can share daily.
Customers travelling this summer can be confident of support
As a travel consultant, your job is to look after your customers. You won’t be able to affect conditions at airports, but you will be there to help if the customer needs to make changes to their plans.
But you won’t be expected to do it alone. You’ll get help dealing with anyone who did happen to be affected through our large Operations team.
We’ll be there to help at stages, because as a franchisor, it’s our job to make your job easier!
Because we’ve recently invested over £1m into more people and systems to help franchisees, there’ll be all the support you need. For example, the average wait time for a phone call to our Head Office support team is just 42 seconds.
Don’t forget that we handle all the ticketing admin for you, as well as providing a dedicated Partnership Manager who’s there to help with any questions you may have.
3/ You’ll be building a long-term business from day one
Think about how you plan your own holidays – it’s often well in advance isn’t it?
That’s usually the case for most people.
It means that starting your business this summer isn’t about just this summer – or even this year.
While we want you to get started fast, we’re more concerned that you have long-term success. It’s about building your customer base up quickly, then leveraging repeat bookings and referrals as you grow over time.
One example is franchisee Ami.
She made her first booking the day she finished training, then went on to make £75k in sales in her first 12 days in business.
But she’s not slowed down after a fast start.
Instead she’s building a fabulous business that she aims to take full-time as soon as possible. You can catch up with her fast-start story in the video below.
Or how about ex-military Staff Sergeant Moses…
He made a £1M cruise booking after just 3 months in business.
Even more astonishingly, Moses had zero travel experience when he started.
This massive booking is for 2023, so Moses knows he has a huge commission cheque to look forward to!
He’s also nominated in the upcoming TTG awards alongside Ami as ‘new agent of the year’.
Franchisee David Walker shows how you can build a big business over time
David started after a 20+ year career in HR, mostly overseas.
Now he’s made over £1m in commissions from travel, thanks to hard work and fantastic customer service.
Find out how he built his business over the past 7 years.
Franchisee Sue’s business took a while to take off.
Not every franchisee has the fast start we’d like for them. Take Sue, who struggled to make any bookings in her first couple of months in business.
She was massively frustrated, until a piece of special training we provided gave her the keys to unlock how she got customers.
It meant that, by May 2022, she’d already made over £300,000 in sales for the year.
You can watch her interview with our head of learning and development Dave Pope below. In it, you’ll hear how she recovered her confidence and built her momentum back up…
