Holiday Asia is one of the popular travel agency in Malaysia that can be your one stop shop from booking a flight ticket, to touring details.

A licensed travel agency, their services include, air ticketing services, hotel reservations of your choice, transportation arrangement (airport pick up to-from the hotel), touring packages, and other services that is related to your purpose in visiting Malaysia.

Malaysia, being a big country with 13 states, can be a tad overwhelming if you plan to invade it for your holiday without proper guidance. Their comprehensive, and affordable tour packages are sure to help you in making the perfect choice to maximize your holiday.

Another travel agency in Malaysia, which has been proven over the years in providing comprehensive holiday packages, is Sunway Travel. They also offer comprehensive and affordable holiday packages that will cater to your needs in going to Malaysia for a holiday.

Travel agencies in Malaysia offer similar products and services but you have to make sure that you compare the prices so as to get the best deals. The common products and services that are available for you are: Travel and Tourism services like air travel ticketing, adventure travel bookings, hotel reservation services, resort reservation services, sightseeing tours packages, limousine services, cruises, other recreation activities guide like golfing, harbor cruises, river cruises, seminar venues, team building , among many others.

Take note that some of the products and services above are not included in the packages that they offer. Make sure that you ask all the questions about the pricing and the rates before confirming to any bookings as you might be surprised at how much you will be given as the final charges.

Also, Malaysia has 13 states, and each state has its own specialty to offer. Make sure that you do proper research on the popular tourist attractions in Malaysia, for you to get the best worth for your money.

Travel Agency in Malaysia is from Travel Agency in Malaysia

A Tour Operator is the organizer and provider of package holidays. It is often referred as the Ground Handler. The Tour Company will make contracts with hotels and resorts, airlines and ground transport companies like private cars, buses, vans, ferries and trains & etc. With all the necessary pricing and information compiled, the Tour Operator will draft detailed tour packages and distribute to Travel Agents in Travel Agent Directory in Malaysia and even overseas.

The roles & responsibilities of a Tour Operator are booking and arranging:

• Transportation: Chaffered Car, Chartered Bus & Van, Air Ticket, Train Ticket, Ferry Ticket, Cruise Ticket, other transit modes and even special vehicles like trishaw.
• Tour Guide: All Tour Guides must be licensed by the Ministry of Tourism Malaysia after attending and examined in a professional Tourist Guide Courses.
• Sight Seeing: Entrance for tourist destinations, eco-tour, adventures tour, jungle trekking, snorkeling & scuba diving, island hopping and even handicraft or cultural & living experiences.
• Food & Beverage: Breakfast, Tea Time or Tea Break, Lunch & Dinner, whether by set, buffet or packed food.
• Accommodation: Hotels, Resorts, Service Apartments, Camping Sites, Dormitories, Training Camps, Chalets, Tree Houses or traditional houses & habitats that accommodating travelers.
• Activities: Tele-match, treasure hunt, paint ball, team building, outside office meeting…
• Special Events: Company dinner, karaoke contest.

On the other hand, Travel Agents do not operate tours. Travel agencies gives traveling advices to travelers, promote and sell the tour packages that they have from various Tour Operators, then administer the tour bookings. Travel Agents usually are set up in prime locations with heavy traffic such as beside the main roads, inside crowed shopping malls or at the ground floor of a landmark building.

The roles & responsibilities of a Travel Agent are:

• Selling ells travel related products and services, particularly package tours to end-user customers on behalf of third party travel suppliers, such as airlines, hotels, tour operator and tour companies, and cruise lines & etc.
• Most travel agents have a special department devoted to travel arrangements for business travelers, while some agencies specialize in commercial and business travelers.
• Some also serve as general service agents for foreign travel companies in different countries.
• Act as an agent for tour packages:
• Buy tour packages or tour services at discounts & sell with profits.
• Get commissions from suppliers & other tour companies.
• Act as a ticketing agent for transportation (e.g. airlines, ferry, bus, train & etc).
• Other commercial operations are undertaken: insurance, travel guides, car rental, Bureau de change, private tour guide & etc.
• Offer impartial travel advice to the customer.

Next time, if you traveling in small group less than 10 travelers, it is advisable to engage a Travel Agent. Do not try to find the best travel agent in Malaysia. There is no such myth! Just go with the travel agent that suit your traveling needs and budgets or the tour agent that you trusted the most. However, if you are organizing a group tour like company tour, a Tour Operator will be able to provide you a more suitable tailor-made service.

The above information are guidelines and advices that 88Holidays provided to its Corporate Clients in organizing group tour. It is simple but useful information to help organizing a successful company tour with many years experiences.

Article by George Ong

Differences of Tour Operators and Travel Agents is from Travel Agency in Malaysia

Walk in to a typical travel agency and you see stack of papers on the shelf with all tour itineraries, some may even be outdated. If you are lucky enough, you get a good pricing for your tour because the travel agency did not update the pricing or tours on a real-time basis. Main challenges for travel agencies include business operations, costings and employee management.

Business Operations Challenges

• Updates of travel packages were not applied across all departments and branches, affecting front desk staffs selling packages with old pricing – incurring losses
• Difficulties for front desk staffs to check on updates as there were no online, centralized database
• Break-down in communications among departments and difficulty to communicate among branches

Costing Challenges

• Tremendous amount of papers used and wasteful printings for travel packages and itineraries – incurring extra overheads
• Employees need to work extra hours to complete checkings and coordination manually – incurring extra employees wages
• Communications using traditional methods including faxes, scans, phone calls and land lines incurring additional costs

Employee Management Challenges

• Fraud of employees punching cards for each other, making losses for extra overtime payments
• Leaves are managed manually without accuracy and often miscalculated
• Additional employees needed every end of month to calculate working hours to compute payroll

Travel Agency Management System – What is Good?
For a travel agency management system to work, it should at least have the below features. I am, however, generalizing based on typical travel agencies which still operate manually in Malaysia. For any IT systems to work, it should solve the biggest challenges and bottlenecks in your business. Therefore the below list is just a general one.

Real-time, centralized travel itineraries and uploading of tour files

- The travel agency management system should be able to centralize data and real-time to allow uploads of tour files for immediate viewing, real-time information across whole company, branches and even with external agents, also allowing front desk staffs to disseminate information accurately.

Preferably integrated with back-end system

- Should business operations be your main challenge, then the system should integrate with back-end system including but not limited to payroll, time attendance system, e-leave management system, billing, accounting and financial implementation, customer relationship management and loyalty programs to name a few.

Payroll calculation and overtime for employees

- At month-end, salaries will be headache especially at agencies which also pay overtime for unpredictable work schedule. An integrated system with payroll for calculation of basic salary, overtime and allowances will save costs and time.

Audit log files for transactions

- Security is also important so the travel agency management system should be able to monitor transactions by viewing transaction history or audit logs of each amendment done.

Preferably with multiple payment types

- Customers will normally pay for a tour with many different methods so a travel agency solution should allow multiple payment types including by cash, cheque, direct transfer, credit card or tele transfer

Connect and maintain centralized customer base with a CRM system

- Details of customers registered for tours should be stored in a common database for better customer relationship management.

Article by Hoong Ling Chew

Three Biggest Challenges of Travel Agencies and How Travel Agency Management Software Should Help is from Travel Agency in Malaysia

Keep in mind that Malaysian population is an integration of social groups, diverse cultures, and traditions. Generally, the different racial groups form a society, but still keep individual lifestyles and traditions. Malays predominate the total population and are still governed by strong decorum and the authority of the elders. The other Asian members of the society originally came to Malaysia to take up civil service positions but are now also among the professional classes. The Western European influence is visible but minimal. Therefore, as a Western traveler, don’t expect to find that your ways will be accepted and understood by most of the locals. Malaysians are hospitable, but they would not change their customs to suit your needs. If you want a successful and hassle-free Malaysia travel, it is better to equip yourself with the knowledge about your host country and its traditions.

Malaysia travel requires that you speak to the locals. Unless you have the extra money for an interpreter, it is best that you learn a few basic and useful Malaysian phrases, and forms of address. You would not be only thought of as considerate but also as a respectful traveler. Locals will also be more helpful and accommodating if you can talk to them, no matter how poorly. A handshake seems to be a universal symbol for peace and goodwill, but unlike the Western handshake, Malays do theirs relaxed and gently as a sign of warmth and welcome. If you want to pay respect to a Malay elder, statue, or temple, simply touch your chest briefly. The way you dress is very important as Malays are very proper people. Don informal clothing bit don’t be overly casual. Some shrines and temples won’t allow visitors to enter if dressed too casually. Speaking of shrines, removing footwear before entering temples, shrines, and houses is a form of courtesy and respect. Despite the many social conventions, visitors can expect lavish hospitality from the locals. Unlike in western countries, giving tips is not practiced, so do not tip even taxi drivers. It may be interpreted as a sign of disrespect. Smoking is also deemed as rude; if you must smoke, go to designated smoking areas in your hotel but never do it on the streets.

Bear this in mind and practice them on your Malaysia travel. You can be guaranteed of a warm welcome and invitations to return from newfound local friends. With respect for others culture and the local residents, any travel will be surely glitch-free.

Article by Mark Peoples

Malaysian Travel Tricks is from Travel Agency in Malaysia