Tour and Travel Operations Manager at Cedar Consulting Ltd

Details:

We are looking for an experienced, competent, self-driven and results-oriented Tours and Travel Operations Manager to join our team!

If you are passionate and enthusiastic about traveling, nature and different cultures, love meeting challenges head-on, great at management – especially managing people, if you are an extrovert or an introverted-extrovert, if you love upsetting competition, you are full of self-confidence and self-belief in yourself and your abilities, and if you love giving others the travel experience of their lives, this job is for you!

The candidate for this position will report to the Managing Director.

Job Objectives:

The role of the Travel Operations Manager is to:

• lead and coordinate the daily activities of travel consultants, consisting of up to 4 travel consultants;
• ensure seamless service to our clients;
• monitoring the overall activity of all travel accounts;
• ensure that call and email volumes are monitored to meet the customer service standards;
• manage and lead team members to ensure that they are available to provide the contracted customer service during working hours; and make arrangements in Global
• Distribution System (“GDS”) for flights, transport, and accommodation for clients.

Responsibilities:

• Sales Marketing
  • Marketing and selling all travel products: Help in promoting and marketing the business, sometimes to new niche markets, this may need time out of the office to see new prospects and dormant clients. Also may require delegation to consultants to specific dormant accounts. (New Business)
  • Account management and customer service: Dealing with customer enquiries and complaints, aiming to meet their expectations.
  • Maintaining and following up on clients for repeat business: (Retention) by ensuring all consultants follow up on clients’ enquiries for closure by calling and emailing to ensure client enquiries are confirmed.
  • Developing business strategies to increase profitability.
  • Ensuring increased sales revenues month by month.
  • Ensure consultants do tele-sales on daily basis (train them if need be) especially on dormant or inactive accounts for the immediate past one week.
  • Track sales per client, undertake comparative analysis of previous year-same month, month to month, and propose strategy to increase or maintain sales.
  • Online booking tool adoption and awareness.
• Operations Management
  • Manage daily service levels across all communications channels.
  • Transaction processing time, that is, turnaround time: Ensure all client enquiries are responded to on time as per Service Level Agreements and the Firm’s turnaround time policies.
  • Ensure that telephone and email service factor are monitored and met.
  • All enquiries and quotations are converted into sales (achieve 80% conversions) through timely follow up of quotations by consultants, keeping records of all enquiries and sales through daily reports.
  • Follow up promptly on clients for feedback on rejected quotations, and measures to correct the problems thereof.
  • Provide the highest levels of service delivery to clients and stakeholders. Ensure all client complaints are resolved within 24 hours of reporting.
  • Ensure 24 hour access to the Firm through consultants and automated response systems, and that availability to service is seamless and efficient.
  • Ensure, in coordination with account management, that all team members are aware of clients travel policies and service level requirements and participate in client meetings when required.
  • Ensure all transactions are charged and that open transactions are investigated and processed in a timely manner.
  • Ensure Ticketing reports are done daily by the consultants by close of business.
  • Create a customer-first culture and manage culture change.
• Financial Management and Reporting
  • Ensure maximum profitability of the travel department to the Firm by negotiating with travel partners for best rates (discounted fares, special fares, commissions etc.) to earn competitive advantage.
  • Ensure airline penalties and losses from consultant errors are minimized, penalties and losses are audited, analyzed, reported and mitigation measures are in place to minimize them.
  • Ensure all ticketing reports are done accurately, consultants countercheck the client invoices before signing for dispatch.
  • Ensure all unutilized tickets (ticket refunds and tax refunds) are done on time.
  • Develop, implement and monitor departmental budgets, maintain statistical or financial records.
  • Submit monthly performance and risk reports to management- sales, profitability etc.
• Administration
  • Develop, review the Firm’s operational policies, processes and procedures.
  • Ensure implementation and compliance to policies and procedures through constant supervision.
  • Ordering stationery and disposables to ensure smooth running of the Firm.
  • Ensure cleanliness of the Firm’s offices.
  • Manage consultants’ weekend rota and 24 hour schedule, thereby ensuring reachability and availability on weekends, holidays and off office hours.
  • Manage consultants leave and attendance.
  • Record keeping for the Firm – clients’ lists, consultants managing the accounts, contracts and pre-qualifications, and contract expiry dates etc.
  • Conduct weekly meetings with consultants (every Monday) to update on Firm’s performance, customer complaints, issues etc.
• People management
  • Monitor team activity and workload in order to identify recruitment needs and seek approval.
  • Participate in recruitment of approved new team members and conduct interviews in a timely manner and in accordance with the Firm’s standards. Final recruitment subject to approval with the Managing Director.
  • Constantly motivating the team to hit their targets and ensure Firm’s growth and profitability.
  • Meeting regularly with the team to give them sales figures and plan how they approach their work.
  • Meeting management to advise on strategy, finding out about any local issues and future trends.
  • Overseeing the recruitment, selection and retention of staff as well as staff training.
  • Organizing incentives, bonus schemes and commissions in liaison with Managing Director.
  • Communicating with consultants and providing encouragement, help and advice.
  • Dealing with disciplinary matters and customer complaints.
• Performance Management
  • Ensure a high level of cooperation and communication between teams, among the operations functions and with all functions in the organization (for instance, account management, finance, sales and IT).
  • Manage, motivate and provide direction to direct reports to achieve agreed targets.
  • Maximize team productivity through ongoing reporting, feedback and counselling, goal setting, review and appraisal process of consultants.
  • Constantly drive direct reports to the consultants to help them achieve their personal and team Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Monitor and provide feedback on a daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly basis.
  • Complete monthly individual reviews with direct reports and frontline travel consultants covering their KPIs and defining resulting action items and/or personal development plans.
  • Provide performance counselling where necessary, both reactively to improve performance and proactively to foster professional development and growth.
  • Risk management
  • Monitor and report on all issues, potential threats and risks pertaining to the Firm, escalating and closing off all risks and threats.
• Leadership and Management
  • Lead, coach, mentor and empower consultants to meet the operational goals.
  • Mentor consultants and identify opportunities for growth within the Firm.

Skills, Interests and Qualities:

• The skills required to perform such work are as diverse as the function itself. The most important skills are:
• Great attitude and personality!
• Excellent written and oral communications skills.
• Organizational abilities - planning and prioritizing through execution to monitoring for productivity and efficiency.
• Analytic capabilities and understanding of processes and implementation of standard operating procedures (SOPs).
• A broad understanding of other functions of the Firm.
• Attention to detail, and analytical.
• Coordination and optimization of processes for maximum efficiency.
• Quick decision-making with a clear focus on problem-solving.
• People skills: must have people skills to properly navigate the fine lines with colleagues, subordinates and senior management; as well as the ability to interact and cooperate with all Firm’s employees.
• Creativity: ability to finding new ways to improve corporate performance.
• Tech-savvy: be familiar with the most common technologies used in the industry, a deeper understanding of the specific operation technology at the organization including PBX Phone system management, Amadeus/Galileo Script writing, TRAMS Interface experience, Client Base Plus development, integration and deployment for leisure or corporate travel, automated ticket-based ticketing and tracking system.
• IT and computer knowledge skills: have sufficient knowledge and expertise with the Galileo/Amadeus GDS platform and web fares integration, working in an automated Quality Control environment, and implementing best practices.
• Resilience to cope with long hours and pressure at peak time
• Innovation and energy with a desire to drive others.
• Commitment to people management.
• Sound judgment.

Qualifications, Experience and Attributes:

• Minimum Bachelor’s Degree: Bachelor’s Degree in Tourism and Travel (or hospitality business related degree) with relevant managerial and travel-related experience.
• Minimum experience: 4 years of direct supervision of front line travel consultants in a corporate travel environment.
• Experience managing leisure, group or event travel.
• Specific functional experience, perhaps in operations, marketing, sales, retail or IT role, may be advantageous.
• Advanced knowledge of GDS system such as Amadeus and Galileo, and online booking software.
• Good leadership skills and knowledge of people management.
• General understanding of KPIs used in travel industry.
• Good understand of customer service skills.
• Good financial understanding of budget and reports.
• A strong business acumen.
• Excellent phone and e-mail etiquette.
• Great work ethic; ability to work with minimal supervision; self-motivated; and ambitious.
• Candidate may be on call 24 hours a day. Should be prepared to work late hours and also on holidays if need be.