A consultant at a leisure agency confirms a Kerala package for a family of six on Monday. By Wednesday the airline has retimed the return flight. The family sends a WhatsApp voice note, polite at first, angry by Friday. The consultant sees the message but is busy chasing a Maldives enquiry that might close for a bigger commission. The reschedule stays on hold until the family calls the owner.
This is the quiet failure of the booking-only scorecard. The pattern is common across travel agencies and tour operators, from domestic packagers to corporate desks. Here is how it shows, what it costs and how to change it.
How it looks on the desk
- Refund and cancellation files sit in a shared sheet with no owner.
- Voucher errors, such as the wrong pickup time or a missing hotel contact, surface at the airport.
- Group blocks near the release date stay unconfirmed because nobody wants to chase.
- Visa file follow-up slips, since a visa is a cost to the agency and not a sale.
- Post-trip feedback calls are skipped. The next season's enquiry never arrives.
None of these tasks earns an incentive. Every one affects whether the traveller books again.
What the owner pays for it
The cost is spread thin and arrives late. Repeat clients drift to an online platform. A supplier such as a hotel or a ground handler stops giving rate flexibility after a bad dispute. A DMC partner moves your group slot to a rival. A chargeback arrives months after the booking commission was paid out. None of this is visible in the month's sales report.
Why it keeps happening
Incentive slabs reward what is easy to count: confirmed bookings, ticketed value, margin. Service work is hard to count, so it falls out of the formula. The consultant is not careless. She is doing the sensible thing within the rules.
There is also a seasonal effect. In the weeks before summer holidays and Diwali, enquiries double and desks run on adrenaline. Service work waits for the quiet that never comes.
A way to fix it, step by step
- 1
Pick three service signals
Use data the desk already has. Reopened cases, refund turnaround days, and share of trips with a completed post-trip call.
- 2
Give each case an owner
Every PNR with a change, refund or visa action carries a named consultant on the shared tracker. A lead checks it at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.
- 3
Add a small service block to the scorecard
Weight it modestly, for example a quarter of the variable pay. Share the definitions in writing before the quarter starts.
- 4
Protect time for service
Set a fixed service hour per shift in which new enquiries go to a floater.
- 5
Review monthly with real cases
Choose two good saves and one miss. Read them aloud, without naming blame.
The performance management page for domestic operators shows how to build a scorecard; the attendance, shift and leave process for corporate desks helps with the service-hour roster.
The service work that goes unseen
Ask a senior consultant what she did last Tuesday outside selling, and the list is long. She worked the schedule-change queue after an airline retimed a sector. She asked a DMC to hold a coach for a group stuck in Delhi. She corrected a meal plan from CP to MAP and an extra bed on a family room. She told a pilgrimage group's tour manager about a temple closure. None of it was logged.
PNR or file number, traveller, lead consultant:
Type: schedule change / refund / voucher fix / visa query / supplier dispute / group block release:
Date raised, promised response time, supplier contacted:
Customer informed on (date and channel), outcome, money moved:
Closed by, date closed, repeat issue? (yes/no):Use the log for a month before you change any pay. The log alone often shows who carries the invisible load.
Two traps to avoid
First, do not turn service into a numbers race on call duration. A short call is not a good call. Second, do not punish honest reports. If a consultant flags a schedule change that she cannot fix, thank her; hiding it is worse.
Seasons bend the rules
Each travel season brings its own service load. Char Dham yatra groups bring waitlists, darshan slots and road closures after landslides. Kashmir winter brings snow-blocked highways and gondola cancellations. Goa monsoon brings ferry halts. Rajasthan weddings bring hotel blackout dates. A consultant who rebooks well in these weeks earns trust that no sales slab captures. Say so, and put a line for it in the review.
Where the lead fits
Team leads often carry their own target and have no spare hour. If you want service to count, relieve part of the lead's sales target. Give the lead time for case reviews, floater planning and supplier calls.
