Become a Home Based Travel Agent

Crunching Numbers, Which Number Should I Use?
By Tom Ogg

The Airline Deregulation Act was signed into law in 1978 and prior to its signing travel agents were appointed by two separate bodies, the ATC (Air Traffic Conference representing U.S. domestic airlines) and IATA (International Airline Transport Association representing international airlines). Deregulation had the effect of blocking recognition of IATA within the United States and the closing of the ATC.  The Airline Reporting Corporation (ARC) was created from the ashes of the ATC and continued appointing travel agents on behalf of both domestic and international airlines.

Before and after deregulation only travel agencies with an airline appointment were considered as valid travel agents. Non-appointed travel agencies didn’t exist, as they could not do business without their “appointment or ARC number”. This 8-digit number identified travel agents giving them access to commissions on sales that they made.The number contained 8-digits as required by the PNR reservation process designed and implemented by Pan American Airlines in the earliest days of computers. It was during this period that “Cruise Only” storefront business models began to appear.

It wasn’t until Delta Airlines capped commissions in 1995 that travel agents started their migration from appointment conforming storefronts to a more cost effective home base. During the following years travel agents saw the demise of airline commissions and were left with a difficult decision, they would have to move home, or evolve new business models to stay in their storefronts.

What ensued was somewhat chaotic as no standard numbering system for travel agents accommodated this new trend of home based travel professionals who had no need for an ARC appointment because they no longer sold or issued airline traffic documents. Since all reservations systems were built around the PNR environment, airlines, tour companies, hotels, resorts, car rental companies were without the ability to identify non-airline appointed travel agents.

Since CLIA was using an 8-digit number to identify its members, many travel agents joined CLIA to use the CLIA number as an identifier. Here is the history of each of the numbering systems and what is available in today’s world. 

ARC: (Airline Reporting Corporation) When airlines stopped paying commissions and agents started going home based, ARC did not respond with a numbering option to identify home based agents until just recently. The VTC  (Verified Travel Consultant) program currently has around 1,300 members, but I suspect that in the future being a VTC will be just as important as being an ARC appointed agent from the supplier's perspective.

The reason is that ARC has been at the very epicenter of the travel agent industry for decades and suppliers worldwide know that if someone has an ARC appointment that they have been thoroughly vetted as a professional. The same is true of the VTC program.I strongly support the VTC program because it is the true sign of a professional. If I were serious about my business, I would become a VTC.

IATAN: (International Airline Travel Agent Network) IATA appoints travel agents everywhere in the world other than the United States. IATAN launched a travel agent numbering system after recognizing the opportunity to provide numbers that were obtained from IATA (note that IATA operates the global travel agent numbering system and both IATAN and ARC obtain their numbers from IATA) IATAN also vets their members, which is why the number is widely accepted.

Several years ago, ASTA approached IATAN to resell IATA numbers to ASTA members and created TravelSellers.com for the purpose of redistributing the numbers to its members. The numbers were then made available to qualifying ASTA and NACTA members. At that time OSSN and ARTA also started selling numbers to their members known as TRUE. Two or three years ago, IATAN stopped selling numbers for redistribution and the reason, as I understand it was because of abuse in the distribution process. ASTA/NACTA closed TravelSellers.com down due to the fact that ARC had entered the travel agent numbering business. Creating a long-term solution for the industry.

TRUE: OSSN was left without access to IATAN numbers when IATAN ceased to offer them to associations and simply decided to start their own. But, make sure that you understand there is little vetting and that ARC’s VTC program will quickly become the  standard of professionalism, in my opinion.

CLIA: (Cruise Line International Association) CLIA had never intended to get into the numbering business. They issued ID numbers for their members that quickly became the number of choice for suppliers that were used to asking for ARC numbers to identify agents in their computer system.  Since CLIA is the most expensive route to obtain a number, suppliers have come to respect it as a viable alternative.

CLIA’s value proposition has little to do with numbers and everything to do with education and support for cruise selling agents.

Pseudo ARC Numbers: When all is said and done, the only reason that most suppliers ask you for your number is because they need to find you in their reservation system as a travel agent. Many suppliers don’t care if you have am VTC, IATAN, TRUE or CLIA number, they just want to find you. If you do not have any of these numbers, then you can talk to the supplier’s sales office and request a booking number that you can use with them. Known as “pseudo ARC numbers” this may be a solution if an agent is going to specialize on a very narrow niche.

As a solution, I would suggest that you get a VTC number, as this will shortly be an important number to obtain and if you specialize in cruises, then join CLIA.