Last week I attended some upper level meetings with dignitaries and company CEO’s from all across the world. There was one constant refrain: It’s not our fault, it’s because of COVID. We are doing the best we can.

I’ve had several customers say to me over the past few weeks that they are sick and tired of hearing “it’s because of COVID”. But here’s the thing, it is. It is because of COVID.

COVID dealt a catastrophic blow to the travel industry, one far worse than even 9/11.

Most of the suppliers we prefer laid off or furloughed at least 75% of their staff. And those staff members remained without jobs for well over a year.

The 25% that remained faced tens of thousands of refunds to process, tens of thousands of trips to rebook, tens of thousands of angry phone calls.

One of my friends in a refund department told me she came to work one morning and in her que were 56,000 refunds to be processed. Can you even imagine that? I can’t.

Our preferred tour operator didn’t even have a refund department before COVID. They had so few cancelations their reservation agents were able to handle it. It’s the same with our preferred river cruise.

The President of one of our favorite Caribbean suppliers told me just this week that first they had to let go of most of their staff, then the minute the restrictions were lifted they were hit with a demand unlike any in the 40 year history of their company.

Making matters even worse, many people who had worked in the travel industry frankly just did not want to come back to work. Travel is a very volatile industry. Election years, the economy, world events, there are many factors that can have detrimental and devastating effects on travel. You can’t blame them for opting out.

Because furloughed workers were “done” with travel, companies had to hire people new to the industry and train them. The training programs are not two days and we put you on the phones. It takes weeks, sometimes months, to train staff that are competent in this industry. My agents all completed a three year training program. Three years.

We are all weary of everything having to do with COVID. I get it. But as you know my own trip to Alaska was canceled last month due to a staff shortage at American Airlines. They furloughed 40,000 people who won’t come back. I can blame it on COVID or not, but either way it’s directly because of the pandemic, and either way I didn’t get to go to Alaska.

I say all of that to say this, it will be years before the travel industry is back to normal, if in fact it ever is. I know there are some aspects of this industry that will be forever changed, some very much for the better.

Please be patient with us and with our suppliers. Hold times are still many hours long, my agents and the agents on the other end are doing their best to handle each situation quickly and competently.

We know your industry was most likely impacted by COVID as well. It’s imperative for us to stick together, to be sympathetic toward each other and allow everyone to go and grow through this with as much kindness as we possibly can.

Your Globetrotting friend,
JOY

Stop blaming COVID