For Immediate Release For further information, please contact:
Communications Department
InteleTravel.com 800.873.5353
Email: communications@InteleTravel.com
FinderTravel.com Adds Canadian Based Air Engine
Now Agents Choose Best Market Fares & Availability
Vancouver, BC - October 27, 2008 - Canadian travel network, FinderTravel.com, powered by longtime host agency InteleTravel.com, has announced that the Canadian affiliate of Travelocity will now provide an online airfare booking engine for use by its Independent Travel Agents. The service is already live and dynamically appears in FinderTravel’s “back-office” operations website when any Agent who resides in Canada logs on. This improvement adds Canadian market inventory and pricing (in Canadian Dollars) to the fares quoted by InteleTravel.com for its associated Agents in the US and 40 other countries worldwide. For Canadian Agents affiliated through FinderTravel.com and its professional services partnerships, this new resource will help to maintain the most competitive FinderTravel quotes for travel customers and for Agents’ own use.
The Travelocity engine is recommended for North American Fares only. As with all travel agents, such published “domestic” fares are not commissionable to travel agents (Discount “international” airfare, however, is booked online through a FinderTravel engine that accesses multiple Consolidators and offers significant commissions.) FinderTravel Agents are expected to utilize the new Travelocity tool to find best North American fares for their own personal travel, and may choose to research, quote and book the fares for customers as a convenience and an inducement toward commissionable sales of international air, hotel, car rental, cruise, vacation, tour, travel insurance and most other travel arrangements. Customers will not have direct access from public web pages.
One of the unique strengths of the FinderTravel program is that it is NOT just a website. Unlike many other host travel agency programs, FinderTravel Agents can book directly with virtually any supplier (hotel, resort, cruise line, etc.), even the regional and ethnic international air consolidators that so often have access to the most competitive pricing, using any method (phone, supplier’s website, etc.), and still earn their commissions. Even so, FinderTravel and its operations partner, InteleTravel, strive to make optimum use of the available online technology in the travel industry, to minimize labor and maximize profit for Agents.
The Canadian Travelocity engine is featured as an additional resource and does not replace the existing air engines based in other markets. Southern Canadian Agents often report that, due to inventory and pricing, it is sometimes advantageous to fly out of nearby US airports just over the US border. Now Agents have a choice.
Other Canada-focused enhancement projects are underway at FinderTravel, including additional regional suppliers, Canadian French translation, and ongoing Agent training and promotional communications tailored just for this selling team.
About FinderTravel
FinderTravel.com is Canada’s largest independent travel agent network, created by Finder Financial Services Ltd, a leading innovator in cost-effective financial solutions for homeowners, and the provider of educational programs and other benefits to professional services partners. FinderTravel’s sales force of real estate and financial professionals has added travel services to the full complement of creative financial products and value they already bring their clients.
About InteleTravel
InteleTravel.com (founded in 1992), “The ORIGINAL Travel Agency At Home”, is the fulfillment and operations partner that powers the FinderTravel program, and the pioneer of the large scale host agency and home-based travel agent model. InteleTravel.com has a worldwide network of thousands of full and part-time independent travel agents who refer families, friends, co-workers and other customers, to its booking technology to purchase all major travel products. For over 15 years, the company has been known for its leadership in travel agency sales, robust preferred supplier relationships, innovative agent education programs and cutting edge travel technology.