Richard Turen
One of the most challenging things we do is properly preparing clients for real dangers they could face on their vacation -- challenging because your attorney may have advised you not to speak about them at all.
You might have been told not to give safety advice that could be interpreted as creating some level of liability for your agency. We work on commission. What sort of car salesman instructs a potential buyer on the safety flaws in the car they might purchase?
The industry sales gurus caution us not to introduce "negatives," that instead we should always be positive about anything we sell. Some agencies have strict prohibitions on the kind of negative statements a travel adviser might make that could cause clients to change their minds about tracking gorillas in Rwanda or doing a self-drive vacation in colonial Mexico.
One mind-set that drives me over the edge is the oft-stated belief by suppliers that their sales people do essentially what advisers do in terms of adequately preparing and qualifying the client to travel. This is how they attempt to justify charging a client the travel adviser's commission although none is involved in the booking.
How, I wonder, is Harvey Headset in the supplier's res center going to discuss in an intelligent manner the issues of risk and reward? Which portion of the tour or cruise options he represents will be identified to the consumer as "dangerous enough to warrant discussion."
What about a discussion of alternative tour options that might remove clients from a dangerous location? Nope, none of that is going to happen.
In fact, many of the headsets taking orders have never experienced the cruises or tours they sell. And what about insurance? How do we ensure the safety of our clients unless we represent several insurance options and choose the one best suited for the particular client?
The major take-away from looking at issues related to our clients' safety when they are traveling overseas is that car accidents are the leading cause of death of American tourists (and by a wide margin).
But each region of the world has its own safety characteristics. Some have high murder rates. In India and Pakistan, road accidents are abnormally high. In places like Vietnam and Cambodia, motorcycles and scooters account for numerous deaths.
Flying regional airlines can be dangerous, and most remain largely unknown without careful research. In Myanmar, for example, the safety record of internal airlines is so poor that the E.U. will not grant them landing rights.
Many intrepid U.S. travelers who want to experience Mount Everest face another challenge before they even set foot on the mountain. They have to land at Nepal's Lukla Airport, considered the world's most challenging for takeoffs and landings. On approach, you go through clouds that seem to mask the surrounding mountains. As the haze clears, passengers can see a 65-foot by 1,500-foot slice of asphalt leading uphill to a precipitous, 2,000-foot drop to a valley below. Four planes did not make the runway in the past 10 years, killing 33 travelers.
Still, the traveler heading for Everest knows the risks and likely knows about the tiny airport at the edge of the world. Clients headed for Asia, Africa, South America and Europe do not, as a rule, have any safety knowledge that might be useful unless they're booked through an agency that subscribes to a security service that provides regular updates to subscribers.
Intelliguide (owned by Northstar Travel Group, which also owns Travel Weekly) is the best of these, but its worldwide content is described in its heading as "developments that may impact your corporate travel program."
Corporate travelers often have to schedule meetings in locations that would not be considered tourist destinations. If, for example, you have a day or two of meetings in Johannesburg or Caracas, your corporate agent needs to be thoroughly up to date on events and whether a private security service on-site is advisable.
A recent Intelliguide daily report, for example, led with these three headlines:
- Troops destroy "terrorist bunkers" in the eastern region of Algeria.
- Suspected Boko Haram militants detonate suicide bombs in far north region of Cameroon.
- Flights have been canceled at Urumqi airport in China as a result of fog.
This is valuable information, but it is geared to a global business traveler. I am unaware of anyone who is offering a safety report designed for leisure travel agents that highlights safety information about places tourists are likely to go.
Are there, for example, neighborhoods near the main pier in St. Thomas where cruisers ought not walk? (There are.)
How can we let our clients know that several areas of downtown Istanbul will be having political demonstrations that could get nasty during their visit?
Many upscale corporate clients are familiar with private security firms that provide highly trained bodyguards, drivers and bulletproof limos when they travel. Their corporate agency often lists dangerous locations cited in security reports to which the agency subscribes.
The leisure adviser rarely has access to these reports. The services are expensive, and none of the major consortia currently offers high-level security analysis designed for vacation travelers.
So when the BBC identifies St. Kitts as "among the most dangerous places on Earth," this might be new information to cruise passengers out to live the dream in the Caribbean cruise brochures. The BBC report asserts that Nevis and St. Kitts, combined, had 24 homicides last year. When you consider that the islands' total population is 55,000, that equates statistically to one of the world's highest murder rates.
The economic situation in Greece, particularly in Athens, has changed the options for inexpensive boutique hotels in the city. Now, the travel counselor needs to know if the streets outside the hotel are safe at night. Is it an area where prostitution is rampant? Are taxis willing to go there?
So here come clients eager to see the world and to live dreams long denied. Given the recent attacks in Paris, they already have more than enough anxiety about their vacation. Are we the last barrier to a trip based on ignorance of local conditions? Or, as caring advisers, is it our job to read the papers each morning, to listen to the BBC each evening and to discuss, with some level of honesty and concern, the welfare of these folks who trust us to give them information needed for a safe, secure vacation experience?
I begin each morning, quite early, scanning my personalized Google news page where I have tried to create a worldwide update of the latest safety issues in tourism areas of the world.
But my list, based on primitive algorithms, is barely sufficient.
Some of us read safety reports from Intelliguide and others. Some of us rely on consortia offices abroad to send us email updates related to local conditions. But I suspect that a large percentage of commission-based travel advisers do not have access to these sources of information, sources that might be updated daily.
The world is a complicated neighborhood. We can't know it all. But it is important that we have discussions about this aspect of travel. It is time that we discuss risk and reward, and to do that we need access to untainted security information for every worldwide destination and scenario.
We largely send our cherished clients around the world where they will be strangers in strange lands with little understanding or knowledge of local conditions. Wouldn't it be helpful if someone produced a detailed safety update on major tourist destinations that we could review each morning?
Unfortunately, despite the availability of this kind of information for the executive business traveler, it seems not to exist for the nice folks who believe the brochures as they leave their neighborhoods, headed for the airport and a dream vacation. How can we best prevent them from being "Innocents Abroad"?