When to call a travel agent

Even though I'm a travel writer, I sometimes use a travel agent. His savvy advice and careful research save me time and money. Like any professional, he charges fees.

It makes sense. "You wouldn't walk into a lawyer's office and expect them to give you free advice," said Chris Russo, president of the American Society of Travel Agents, or ASTA, a trade group based in Alexandria, Va.

But some travel agents do give free advice. Because they earn sales commissions of 10% or more from certain cruise and tour companies, they often charge nothing to book these. Not so with airline tickets, which generally don't earn commissions, and some complicated itineraries that may take hours or days to assemble.

Travel agents, who sell nearly 40% of all travel in the U.S., can be helpful. But knowing when to engage one and what to pay can be confusing.

I contact my agent to book cruises and vacation packages, for which he charges nothing, and foreign trips, where his services are invaluable. I book my own domestic air tickets and hotels. (To find an agent, try the database at www.travelsense.org.)

As suppliers tighten up on sales commissions, more agents are charging. Depending on the agency and the service, you may pay nothing, a flat fee, a percentage of the trip cost or by the hour. The chart with this column shows median fees charged last year by members of ASTA.

Here's what to expect and why:

Air tickets: Nearly all travel agencies charge fees, typically $25 or more, to book these. That's because major airlines stopped paying sales commissions on domestic tickets in 2002.

Issuing a ticket isn't cheap, said Russo, who runs Travel Partners in Broomfield, Colo. It may cost about $30 per booking, he said, when he factored in salaries and overhead such as office leases, insurance and fees to access the ticket clearinghouse.

Cruises and tours: Last year, less than a third of agents charged fees to book these trips. But that number may be increasing for cruises as agents get caught between falling fares and sales commissions.

Cruise lines have begun deducting port fees, fuel surcharges and other items from the total eligible for commission, said Joe McClure, president of Montrose Travel in Montrose. With some fares less than $100 per person per day, it may not pencil out for the agency.