Why It’s Important to Stay Alert When You Travel
We know as a travel management company (TMC) that when anybody flies for their trip, a critical moment can occur out of nowhere at any time. It’s like a blind spot when you think about it. Delays and cancellations can appear unexpectedly at travelers and hit them hard like a football linebacker is sacking a quarterback from behind. This is because most travelers are not informed about a critical moment and just simply don’t know about it until it’s too late. This can be especially frustrating for an NGO or a corporate traveler. The fact that they find out that their flight got canceled just because of either an earthquake, inclement weather, political revolution, or a power outage in a particular area. Either way, once a traveler is informed that their flight is delayed or cancelled, they then have to go to the airline desk where they find themselves in a very long line with other angry travelers. And because of that long and dreadful line that travelers might have to wait in, their flight might get rebooked for a later date which can then make it inconvenient for them. Now if you had one of our travel counselors booking your reservations, they would have let you know ahead of time if some sort of emergency was occurring in the area in which you were in, and it’s because our travel consultants have the Sabre Traveler Security system. In fact, this is a part of our service and it’s free. Knowing ahead of time cannot only help reduce NGO and corporate travelers’ frustrations when traveling, but it can also reduce their risk of traveling in dangerous parts of the world.
Being alerted is very important especially for NGO and corporate travelers that fly to international countries. One of the ways that you and other travelers can be alerted about emergency crises that are going on around the world is by going on our website. When you arrive on our website (www.ewatravel.com), you will notice that we always keep up-to-date information including daily international travel alerts. We do this because we want to inform our NGO and corporate travelers on what’s happening around the world. It’s one of the ways we communicate with you.
Our website isn’t the only resource for our travelers to use when they want to know what’s happening around the world. We also have our travel counselors inform our travelers no matter what part of the world they might be in if something major is going on. So say for example that you were in Congo giving out Malaria vaccinations to a village, when all of a sudden a volcano erupts 60 miles away from your location. What are you going to do? Are you going to panic? I hope the answer is no! You wouldn’t have to worry about it if you had one of our travel agents by your side. In fact, our expert travel counselors can know about a particular travel alert before you do and it’s because they use the Sabre Traveler Security system.
This security system informs our travel consultants of global catastrophes that are going on around the world. In fact, the Sabre Traveler Security program allows our travel counselors to pinpoint all travelers’ locations and contact information in affected areas. Our travel counselors monitor global events and crises, as well as performing searches for any affected travelers on a daily basis. The assigned travel agents can immediately contact both the travelers and the travel managers to determine what itinerary changes can be made. Having that immediate connection and contact can help NGO, corporate, and international travelers avoid any danger. Not to mention waiting in long lines at the airports to get immediate assistance. Because of this security program that is used at our company, the EWA Travel counselors can quickly make any changes and rebook reservations right away, so that way travelers won’t have to worry about booking any flights to come home at the airport. It’s one of the reasons why having a travel counselor is still important to have today.
Being alerted can very important for anybody that travels internationally especially for those that are NGO and corporate travelers. You never know what can happen when you travel. It’s one of the ways of reducing risk for our travelers. Here at EWA Travel, we are the ones that know ahead of time when a disaster is occurring and we let our travelers know about it right way.
Paul Kacoyanis
Director, Social Media Marketing, EWA Travel