Many years ago, before I'd discovered the internet, I went into a local travel agent to book a holiday to Cyprus. As they didn't have convenient flights the agent suggested Tunisia which I'd never actually thought of. I decided to risk it as it was only for a week and now it's almost my second home.

Hi Fiona , I suppose different things interest different people , I enjoy searching for holidays etc and probably spend too much time !! I only have to use a computer at work for a short time , and its so ***** slow it feels like ages , how it hasn't been accidentally Kung fu 'd off the desk or ingested a hot mug of tea is a miracle , everyday I think of different ways it can be maimed ,
But when at home with my iPad I will sit in my gazebo , with a drink and spend quite a bit of time looking at holiday and travel info etc , I like to research as much as I can , and can't believe some people don't , but that's up to them , I think that if you fail to prepare , be prepared to fail !! Sounds like something David Brent would say

So easy for those who are computer and internet savvy to "mock" those who either know nothing about them or don't want to know when they get home. No matter what the experts say around 15% of the population do not have a computer or if they do have no interest or understanding of the internet. I personally find computers a pain much of the time, and I actually teach people how to use them.
Nothing really has changed when booking holidays as far as I am concerned. I still browse the brochures to get ideas if we want a change. Yes I do use the internet to research things but the short list still comes from the brochure as it has done for many years. I still go into the local, in my case Thomson shop and book my holiday. People ask why I don't just use the net or put my own holiday together. Yes with my computer/internet skills it would be easy but I have no desire to do so and I know many people who feel exactly the same.
Reading some of the stories here on HT, and it is only a very tiny number of complaints we hear of - being computer/internet savvy does not guarantee that you are going to have the perfect holiday. At least when you go into your local travel agency you speak to "a real person" When things go wrong you can actually enlist the help of "a real person" so lets not knock it. Thousands of people will continue to do it the old fashioned way and not all of them will have a problem.

fwh

fwh.....the problem with using your "local" travel agents is that they may be "real people"-but they probably haven't been any further than Marbella ,and, in my experience they are all under 30!!!
And there are many stories of inadequate/no information being passed on via a shop when things are changed by the tour op.
Gave up using shops about 12 years ago when we first looked at the Caribbean - the main shops in town knew next to nothing about these destinations - I remember one girl in Going Places who told me that Cuba was a Communist country so it would be very dangerous to travel there !!!!!

You can be disappointed whichever way you book if you haven't done you own research first and don't read the T&Cs on either the website or the back of the brochure. I haven't the time to count but my subjective impression is that the majority of complaints we now get posted here relate to bookings made on the Net and that a number of them are from young people who would probably consider themselves to be very Internet and IT savvy.

You are either someone who researches your holidays in great detail before deciding on your destination, reads all the small print before booking and makes interminable lists so you don't forget anything or you aren't. I think that it's more about personal disposition and very little to do with the Internet and how computer savvy you are. I've always been one of the first group and spent ages researching our first walking holidays in the Slovenian Alps before eventually settling on the resort we went to and the TO we went with. All done in the 1980s long before the advent of a PC on every office desk or in most homes. Yes, it would possibly take less time these days now that you can look things up on the Net but I'm not so sure given how much dross there is that you have wade through in order to get to the valuable nuggets of information.

SM

I did say in my original post that not everyone has a computer. And I am not belittling travel agents or brochures. I just think that if nothing else, if you have a computer at home, look at hotel reviews. I am one who researches for hours but I know that's not for everyone. And I have booked everything from DIY to through at TA. My mother books their holidays through a travel agent or coach tour company. She gets the proposed itinerary and then looks for info on the web about the hotels.
My friend is actually quite stressed about her holiday and neither of them knowing which places to choose. They have been back and forward to the TA for months.
Its really not about how you book it- but using the resources that are there for you to use.

My DS and his 9 mates all went into co-op travel in our home town and let the travel agent sort out the complete holiday for them some were still 17 at the time of booking although all were 18 by date of travel.

They ended up going there four maybe five times, paying off £100 a month etc, sorting insurance all sorts of things. I think the girl in the agency even chose the hotel (not 100% certain now but I think he said she had been there).

For them the agent played a huge role in the process as it was their first independent holiday and they didn't know what to do.

Most of these kids have been on computers since they were three years old !

Sometimes it's not about being clueless on computers it's about being clueless on holiday matters.

I reckon a lot of the complaints we see on here about travel republic and onthebeach are due to people not being computer savvy and not noticing things like when the computer system adjusts their chosen date to the available dates, or changes their airport and they just don't notice on the screen and press submitt.

I think that it can also come down to experience , I dread to think of how naive I was years ago regarding holidays and travel and required the experience and expertise of a travel agent , now with more information instantly available I can make choices and decisions that are more tailored to my needs , I always feel that I'm still only learning and that if i research more it will help me , I like to look at how I can do things better to get the maximum from my holiday ,
for example , we go to Dubai in November , and 2 years ago we had a daytime flight , but arrived at the hotel around midnight , so the following year we booked a nighttime flight , slept on the plane and arrived early morning and had arranged early checkin at the hotel who also picked us up , it was better for us , but then we thought that we had our 2 centre stay the wrong way round we always did 3 nights at a luxury desert resort and then 5 nights at a beach resort , we thought that we didn't get enough out of our desert stay as you really want to relax as soon as you arrive on holiday , so this year we're doing 5 nights at the beach to kick back and relax before moving onto the desert for 3 nights to explore and enjoy .
It easy to do things the same way all the time , and there are some routines that I like and will always keep to , but I do like to have different options to change things if I want to , as Fiona said , it's about using all the resources at your disposal to get what is perfect for you .

brewerdave wrote:

fwh.....the problem with using your "local" travel agents is that they may be "real people"-but they probably haven't been any further than Marbella ,and, in my experience they are all under 30!!!

That is very stereo typical of you, by the time I was thirty I had been to 6 of the 7 continents in the world, been as far away as visited half of Australia, most of the major Northern American Cities, Northern & Southern Europe and a large chunk of most Asian cities including Hong Kong, Siem Reap, Tokyo. Yet I know people three times my age who have never been out of the country and could not tell you a thing- don't confuse age with inexperience or inability....

BY-TOM-AMM-FCA wrote:

brewerdave wrote:

fwh.....the problem with using your "local" travel agents is that they may be "real people"-but they probably haven't been any further than Marbella ,and, in my experience they are all under 30!!!

That is very stereo typical of you, by the time I was thirty I had been to 6 of the 7 continents in the world, been as far away as visited half of Australia, most of the major Northern American Cities, Northern & Southern Europe and a large chunk of most Asian cities including Hong Kong, Siem Reap, Tokyo. Yet I know people three times my age who have never been out of the country and could not tell you a thing- don't confuse age with inexperience or inability....

...you obviously haven't met the 20 somethings working in our local Holiday Hypermarket!!!!!

brewerdave wrote:

BY-TOM-AMM-FCA wrote:

brewerdave wrote:

fwh.....the problem with using your "local" travel agents is that they may be "real people"-but they probably haven't been any further than Marbella ,and, in my experience they are all under 30!!!

That is very stereo typical of you, by the time I was thirty I had been to 6 of the 7 continents in the world, been as far away as visited half of Australia, most of the major Northern American Cities, Northern & Southern Europe and a large chunk of most Asian cities including Hong Kong, Siem Reap, Tokyo. Yet I know people three times my age who have never been out of the country and could not tell you a thing- don't confuse age with inexperience or inability....

...you obviously haven't met the 20 somethings working in our local Holiday Hypermarket!!!!! :rofl