Travel Agent Value

In reading the lament of Bonnie Elstein regarding her problems with Priceline.com (“Good, Bad Cyber-Trips,” Letters, June 20), all I can say is that if she had used the services of a professional travel agent (I work for a travel agency) instead of trying to save a buck by using an online booking service, none of this would have happened.

With the online booking engines moving at a glacial-slow pace, one can only wonder how much time she spent in order to be permanently separated from her money.

When will the public realize that just because something is on the Internet does not necessarily mean it is some sort of panacea?

Still, as she said, it does help to read all the fine print, doesn’t it?

IRIS MESSINA

Los Angeles

As a travel industry lawyer, I can say that the professional travel agent has the knowledge and experience to advise and help the traveler.

The computer, the Internet and the consolidators do not, and could not care less. The travel agent has the ability and the interest to recommend the right hotel, the restaurant with the view and the best side trips available.

It is a little-known fact that in tests that have been run, the professional travel agent is more often able to obtain the least expensive, and certainly the best, booking--not the computer and not the consolidator. The travel agent is both needed and necessary.

Last-minute empty seats made available at discounted prices on strange flights to leftover rooms in old hotels are not what the public needs or wants.

DAVID B. BOLLER

Glendale