This article is the second in a two-part series.
WASHINGTON -- The International Airlines Travel Agent Network
lost 5% of its endorsed locations last year due to the general
shrinkage of the trade.
Iatan president Michael Maino said the corporation listed 36,545
travel agency, satellite ticket printer and travel service
intermediary firms at the end of 1999, down from 38,437 firms at
the end of 1998.
Last year's total included 30,172 firms that were single-office,
home and branch retail locations, a loss of 834 firms, or 3%, from
31,006 at the end of 1998.
Iatan, based in Garden City, N.Y., listed 6,373 satellite ticket
printer sites at the end of last year, down 14% from 7,431 at the
end of 1998.
Maino pointed out that the loss of staffed locations would have
been greater without the travel service intermediary category for
firms that sell travel without holding airline ticket stock, such
as cruise-only firms.
Iatan listed 594 travel service intermediaries at the end of
last year, up 58% from 376 at the end of 1998.
"If you factor out the growth of 218 travel service
intermediaries, we actually lost 1,052 travel agencies" instead of
834, said Maino, attributing the attrition to mergers, bailouts and
retirements.
Iatan's figures cannot be directly compared with ARC's because
ARC accredits only firms with airline ticket stock, but to put the
organizations in some sort of context, ARC listed 43,669 staffed
and satellite ticket printer locations at the end of last year,
down 4%.
Iatan's travel service intermediary category started life as the
cruise-only category in 1996 and attracted 101 such firms by the
end of that year.
In 1997, the category was expanded to additional types of firms
without airline ticket stock, such as travel agencies that stopped
issuing air tickets, motorcoach operators and meeting planners. By
the end of 1997, 208 firms were in the category.
Although Iatan imposed stringent endorsement standards on travel
service intermediaries, ASTA was upset that Iatan expanded its
programs beyond what was considered to be the traditional travel
agency. ASTA got upset again when Iatan opened its programs this
year to ARC-accredited corporate travel departments.
Maino said, "We get criticized every time we open our programs"
to new types of firms that evolve in the marketplace. "But we've
moved deliberately and responsibly."
For example, he said, "we made sure the corporate travel
department category wasn't a flash in the pan before we took
action. Corporate travel departments are part of the industry,
whether people like it or not."
He said Republic National Bank of New York, the first
ARC-accredited corporate travel department, was the first to apply
for Iatan endorsement. If endorsed, the bank would register six
travel staffers with Iatan and apply for identification cards for
all of them.
Maino said five of the employees were registered and four held
cards when they were on the payroll of the bank's former travel
agency.