A travel agency is a private retailer or public service that provides travel and tourism related services to the public on behalf of suppliers such as airlines, car rentals, cruise lines, hotels, railways, and package tours. In addition to dealing with ordinary tourists most travel agencies have a separate department devoted to making travel arrangements for business travelers and some travel agencies specialize in commercial and business travel only. There are also travel agencies that serve as general sales agents for foreign travel companies, allowing them to have offices in countries other than where their headquarters are located. A travel agency may offer every possible service or specializes in a certain type of business.
In that sense travel agencies can be divided into different types according to the services they offer. Here are some examples:
Full-service travel agency
· Offering all services and products related to international and domestic travel.
· It is equipped to handle all types of travel such as holiday and business travel on individual or group based.
· Smaller agencies situated in residential areas tend to concentrate on leisure travel.
· larger agencies serving commercial areas will concentrate on business travel.
Corporate/ Business travel agency
· Specialize solely in servicing the travel needs of the business or corporate clients, in that sense they deal with work-related and incentive travel.
In-house travel agency
· Differs from the corporate travel agency in the sense that they work with only one corporate account doing mainly business travel but also handling the leisure side for corporate clients.
Specialty agencies
· Result of specific market needs, serving the needs of market segments such as senior citizens, incentive groups or adventure travelers.
Tour guide
A tour guide or tourist guide provides assistance, information and cultural, historical and contemporary heritage interpretation to people on organized tours and individual clients at educational establishments, religious and historical sites, museums, and at venues of other significant interest. The CEN (European Committee for Standardization) definition for "tourist guide"– is:
Tourist guide - person who guides visitors in the language of their choice and interprets the cultural and natural heritage of an area, which person normally possesses an area-specific qualification usually issued and/or recognized by the appropriate authority.
CEN also produced a definition for "tour manager":
Tour manager - person who manages and supervises the itinerary on behalf of the tour operator, ensuring the programme is carried out as described in the tour operator's literature and sold to the traveller/consumer and who gives local practical information.
