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Top Travel Agency Challenges and its Expert Solutions: Case Study

• Written by Varun Bhagat
• Published November 30, 2023

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“Traveling an extra mile for your convenience”

Tourism is emerging as one of the biggest human resource absorbing sectors providing millions of job opportunities, investment opportunities, and business avenues for travel agencies. Acting as an intermediary or even one-stop solution for clients, travel agencies have to cater to a large audience on a daily basis along with humongous data management.

Trade experts predict that the travel industry is expected to reach revenue of $1.7 trillion by the year 2022 . With such a booming sector, the stakes are often quite high! Despite being one of the largest business domains, travel business owners face several issues on a daily basis. One of them is their recurrent billing and serving a huge client base.

Invoicera was made familiar to the existing conundrum of these travel agencies through one of our clients. They came with several invoicing problems along with challenges to manage their staff, vendors, and clients. Every business tries its best to capture maximum market share in order to extend the best in industry services, but such challenges often render them helpless to overpowering issues.

Here are some of the Travel agency challenges which were presented before us.

Challenge 1: Huge Client Base but no effective management tool

Travel agencies enjoy a huge client base and their business operation runs throughout the year across national borders. The request for the services could be either made online, offline or even through mobile apps. They not only have to manage the data but also make their processes faster for enhances efficiency.

Our client came with the issue of data management wherein, he had to send timely invoices to recurrent clients along with tour package details, currency conversion rate, city tax inclusions and much more on a single platform. As discussed above, travel agencies serve to a huge client base and sometimes acts as an intermediary between the vendors and customers. Hence separate dedicated portals are required for efficient management.

Invoicera created an all in one portal for the client which had the following features:

>>> Importable client list into the Invoicera account with relevant details.

>>> Dedicated space for client service for enhanced efficiency.

>>> Issue Purchase Orders which can be converted into Invoices.

>>> The agent can access all the services and bookings done in the past.

>>> Late payment addition, Credit notes were issued if there was an advance payment.

>>> Healthy cash flow through regular payments are done online.

Let us have a Quick View of this Video to know Challenges and its Solution

Challenge 2 – Unable to cater to recurrent accounts

Most of the travelers have become smart nowadays and are now fully aware of their packages. Agencies always try to satisfy the needs of their recurrent clients in order to ensure smoother cashflow and better management of the client’s account. Payment management is yet another issue in such scenarios.

As an all-round travel agency, our client had the motive to serve as many requests as they can. Most of their customers were business firms that had frequent travelers along with tourists bookings. In such a scenario, the customers had to be billed on a regular basis.

This was achieved by setting up an in-house bespoke recurrent billing software which generated invoices on the basis of time conditions. This automated billing software was able to manage the frequency of invoices in order to build a reliable relationship.

The client could also send regular payment reminders and late fees in case of late payments. All the pending, approved and received payments can be tracked through custom reports for better analysis along with acute record-keeping in real-time.

Challenge 3 – Adding their charges and taxes to the invoice

The traditional invoices which are generated are subjected to the legal systems of the native country. In such a case, the uncustomized invoices become a mess as they have to customize as per the laws and regulations of the destination country. The taxes, charges, duties, etc have to be added in the invoice beforehand to avoid any trouble upon reaching.

Often times, travel agencies extend their services as a third party in which they act as a medium between the customer and booking agency. In such scenarios, they often have to add their own service charge to the invoice. For example, an agent booked a package from your firm for one of his clients. Hence while giving out the invoice to your agent, you would add your nominal service charge, profits, and relevant taxes too. This could only be done if the agency has to sole authority to edit their invoices.

  We created a self-serving portal for our client wherein every field of the invoice could be edited as per the norms of the agency. They could customize the details which could be added to the invoice, such as taxes, charges and much more to send invoices at a lightning-fast speed.

Challenge 4 – Currency and Language barrier

The tourism business is one of the largest growing trends catering to huge market share right from leisure tourists to business professionals. Business tourism is not just about global connectivity but is also seen as a viable income option as well.

Since international tourism is on the rise, hence there is an emerging need to customize our invoices as per the language and currency system of the client’s country. An ineffective system would hamper our client’s ability to target the global market and clientele leaving their customers confused in a foreign local.

If the invoice is created in a language and denomination system local to the client, then it becomes difficult for them to adopt the legacy systems of their destination country.

In order to bridge this gap, custom invoicing software was created which allowed them to fix this issue.

In order to facilitate their invoicing, the client could now send invoices in the language which was native to their customers. They could choose from a group of international languages for effective communication. Not only this, but they could send their invoices as per the denomination system of the customer’s country. Invoicera comes with more than 30+ integrated payment gateways, thus receiving or sending money will never be a problem irrespective of their location anywhere in the world. They could even track their payments through filtered tracking and update their invoices in real-time if necessary.

Challenge 5 – Tedious Invoicing Process

As discussed above, the travel agency invoices have to be detailed for effective communication. They have to send recurring bills to their regular clients and also have to do regular follow-ups for payments.

In case of late payment, it could lead to an imbalanced account leading to a cash crunch. Hence they again need an efficient expense management tool that could help them in managing their expense reports, financial forecasting and tailor-made reports for effective analysis.

Since our client had an international user base too, hence it was of grave importance to provide a fruitful solution to their predicaments which could have had an adverse impact on their business. Huge staked were in front of us as the software had to be customized completely as per their needs and integrate it into their existing systems. Along with all the challenges, providing them secure data hosting cloud storage was also important to avoid data theft or leakage.

We created an all in one invoicing software for our client which provided one-stop solutions to them. Invoicera comes with an efficient expense management system that allowed the client to maintain balanced accounts through custom reports. Invoicera also provided 60+ integration into their existing ERP & CRM systems to facilitate smoother workflow

The custom financial reports came in handy for financial forecasting helping them to strategize better for their business. These custom reports could be filtered as per the given attributions, thus simplifying the whole invoicing process and sending lightning-fast invoices in one click.

Do you want to know about solutions done through Invoicera?

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Invoicera banks upon its 14+ years of experience in this domain, very well knowing what our client wants. The custom billing software made it possible for them to utilize their resources to the maximum along with enhancing their overall productivity. 

Invoicera takes pride in providing our clients with an expert software solution in a limited time. Through customized software integrated into their existing legacy systems, Invoicera provided them features like custom billing, client management, recurring billing, expense management, multi-language and currency, payment management, customized invoicing along several others feature with one of the most trusted client service satisfaction. 

After some regular follow-ups, the client appreciated our efforts and told us how they have simplified their business process and made it faster almost by 40%. Switch to the best invoicing software appreciated by over 3+ million users worldwide.

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Case Study: Should a Hotelier Invest in a New Kind of Online Travel Agency?

• Chekitan S. Dev
• Peter O’Connor

A major brand considers a different strategy.

Lotta Tindal, the chief marketing officer for the Dutch hospitality group Ervaring Hotels & Resorts, hadn’t wanted to come to the presentation, but Gerard Bakker, Ervaring’s CFO, had twisted her arm.

• CD Chekitan S. Dev is a professor of strategic marketing and brand management in the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell University’s SC Johnson College of Business.
• PO Peter O’Connor is a professor of information systems at ESSEC Business School in Paris.

Partner Center

Sustainable Food Chains and Ecosystems pp 63–77 Cite as

Statistical Analysis on the Impact of Online Travel Agents’ (OTAs) Commission Structure on Hotels’ Revenue Management

• Vangelis Manousakis 8 &
• Andreas Mattas 9  
• First Online: 31 March 2020

597 Accesses

Part of the book series: Cooperative Management ((COMA))

One of the most critical challenges facing the hotel sector has been the dominant position achieved by the Online Travel Agency (OTA) leading to a radical change in the electronic distribution chain. The application of the merchant model has the hoteliers paying a high commission margin and losing control over their inventory and final sales prices, as they watch how many of their customers are induced to buy through online intermediaries. This paper analyzes the impact of OTAs’ commission structure on hotels’ revenue management. A study is also carried out on the level of use of OTAs by hotels and the fairness of the commission rates, the bargaining power with the OTAs, the efficiency of the OTAs’ marketing strategy and the effectiveness of commission rates on pricing policy.

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Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania (CIHEAM MAICh), Chania, Greece

Vangelis Manousakis

Department of Economics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece

Andreas Mattas

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Konstantinos Mattas

Faculty Center for Entrepreneurship, Governance & Stewardship, Nyenrode Business University, Breukelen UT, The Netherlands

Henk Kievit

TIAS School for Business and Society, Utrecht, The Netherlands

Gert van Dijk

Department of Business Economics & Management, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania, Chania, Greece

George Baourakis

Department of Production Engineering and Management, Technical University of Crete, Chania, Greece

Constantin Zopounidis

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Manousakis, V., Mattas, A. (2020). Statistical Analysis on the Impact of Online Travel Agents’ (OTAs) Commission Structure on Hotels’ Revenue Management. In: Mattas, K., Kievit, H., van Dijk, G., Baourakis, G., Zopounidis, C. (eds) Sustainable Food Chains and Ecosystems. Cooperative Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39609-1_5

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Please note you do not have access to teaching notes, understanding the emergence and development of online travel agencies: a dynamic evaluation and simulation approach.

Internet Research

ISSN : 1066-2243

Article publication date: 27 July 2020

Issue publication date: 24 October 2020

With the explosive growth of the Internet, online travel agents (OTAs) have gained an increasing market share in the online booking market. However, OTAs are facing fierce competition from hotels' direct booking channels, as well as competition among themselves. Therefore, there is a need for an understanding of the evolution of the OTA market from a dynamic perspective. The purpose of this study is to investigate the long-term effect of OTAs on the hospitality industry and to find whether an equilibrium of this effect exists in the context of e-commerce.

Design/methodology/approach

To gain a better understanding of the OTA market process, a mathematical framework is constructed on the basis of four assumptions. NetLogo 5.1.0 is used to perform a series of numerical simulations.

The results indicate the following: (1) the development of the OTA market helps to improve net social welfare, but hotels (especially economy hotels) have suffered as a result; (2) clever exploitation of both online and offline channels that are based on hotels' historical data may improve hotels' performance; (3) a scale-priority strategy can be more helpful than a profit-priority strategy for enabling OTAs to maintain their long-term competitiveness; (4) the timing of participation in online-channel competition is a crucial factor in determining whether OTAs can achieve business success.

Social implications

In this study, it is shown how consumer habits have changed since the development of OTAs. The online channels provided by OTAs create a convenient, low-cost user experience, and they consequently improve the net welfare of customers. OTAs should be encouraged appropriately, although some economy hotels may suffer from the rise of OTAs.

Originality/value

In this empirical study, a mathematical framework is developed to describe the process of evolution in the OTA market, and it uses simulations as a means to validate prior research findings. Unlike previous studies, a dynamic perspective is used in this investigation to interpret the emergence of OTAs and to analyze their enormous impact on the hospitality industry. Thus, the findings of this study capture the competitive characteristics of online and offline channels in a network context and indicate potential strategies for the development of OTAs and which hotels may use OTAs to achieve better performance. In addition, the study findings could be easily extended to explain many of the classical economic phenomena regarding firms with intangible products.

• Online travel agency
• Online channel
• Stackelberg game

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants Number: 71701166) and Central University Basic Scientific Research Business Expenses Special Founds (Grants Number: JBK2004006).

Lv, X. , Li, N. , Xu, X. and Yang, Y. (2020), "Understanding the emergence and development of online travel agencies: a dynamic evaluation and simulation approach", Internet Research , Vol. 30 No. 6, pp. 1783-1810. https://doi.org/10.1108/INTR-11-2019-0464

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Recent Release | 27 Oct 2022

The Economic Impact of Online Travel Agencies in Europe 2019 – 2021

Tourism Consulting Team

Tourism Economics

OTAs generate additional travel demand for accommodations in Europe boosting GDP and job creation. In particular independent accommodations benefit from OTAs by accruing a larger share of bookings than the market average. OTAs support more equitable development across Europe by orienting consumers towards rural areas. Consumers in Europe also benefit from OTAs through more affordable rates offered to travellers.

This study below quantifies the incremental impact of online travel agencies (OTAs) on the tourism industry and broader economy of Europe. The number of travellers organising travel through OTAs increased steadily from 2012 to 2019 to 1.2 billion nights which represented almost 1 in 3 nights booked in Europe – a proportion of these nights, and associated economic benefits would not have happened without the trusted information, transparency and choice provided by OTAs. All travel bookings fell sharply during the pandemic, including some shifts in OTA use resulting in a lower impact on the tourism market and the broader economy in 2020 and 2021. OTAs still play an important role in matching evolving consumer demand with available supply.

Watch here to find out more about The Economic Impact of Online Travel Agencies in Europe .

About the team

Our consulting team at Tourism Economics are the world’s leading analysts of the global tourism and travel sector. They combine their expert insight with our state-of-the-art economic models and tools to answer the crucial questions facing our clients. Lead consultants on the project were:

Matthew Dass

Associate Director, Tourism Economics

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4 Challenges Faced by Online Travel Agents in 2024

The rise of digitalization has disrupted the travel industry. In this modern era, the tech-savvy travelers’ needs are fast evolving, and meeting their expectations is crucial and challenging. Travelport research found that 33% of travelers are more likely to book using OTA. OTAs are the preferred choice for convenience, global access, price transparency, etc., and play a key role in the hotel distribution channel. It’s not just a matter of being able to keep up but staying in front and maintaining a competitive edge over their competitors. 

Read our Infographic to learn more about the challenges faced by Online Travel Agencies.

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Referral Partner will not be entitled to receive any Referral Fees for any subsequent services which are beyond the first transaction.

A renewal of a Qualified Sale shall not be considered a new Qualifying Transaction and shall not entitle Referral Partner to any Referral Fee.

Referral Fee shall be paid only when the actual invoicing amount have been collected from Qualified Sales. Referral Partner shall not be entitled to receive payment of Referral Fees for Qualifying Transactions remaining unpaid.

LICENSES AND OWNERSHIP

Company Marks. Subject to the terms and conditions set forth in this Agreement and solely for the purposes hereof, Company grants to Referral Partner a non-transferable, non-exclusive license, without right of sublicense, to use the Company trademarks, service marks, and logos as approved by Company (the “Company Marks”) to perform its obligations set forth in this Agreement. The use of all Company Marks, including placement and sizing, shall be subject to Company’s then-current trademark use guidelines, if any, provided by the Company. If the Company Marks become, or in Company’s opinion are likely to become, the subject of an infringement claim, Company may at its option modify or replace the Company Marks and require Referral Partner to cease use of the allegedly infringing Company Marks. Referral Partner shall promptly provide Company with samples of all materials that use the Company Marks for Company’s quality control purposes. If, in Company’s discretion, the Referral Partner’s use of the Company Marks does not meet Company’s then-current trademark usage policy, Company may, at its option, require Referral Partner to revise such material and re-submit it under this Section prior to display, or release of further materials bearing or containing such Company Marks. Except for the right to use the Company Marks set forth above, nothing contained in this Agreement shall be construed to grant to Referral Partner any right, title or interest in or to the Company Marks, and all right, title, and interest in and to the Company Marks shall be retained by Company. Referral Partner acknowledges that Company asserts its exclusive ownership of the Company Marks and the renown of the Company Marks worldwide. Referral Partner shall not take any action inconsistent with such ownership and further agrees to take all actions that Company reasonably requests to establish and preserve its exclusive rights in and to the Company Marks. Referral Partner shall not adopt, use, or attempt to register any trademarks or trade names that are confusingly similar to the Company Marks or in such a way as to create combination marks with the Company Marks.

Company Materials. Subject to the terms and conditions set forth in this Agreement and solely for the purposes hereof, Company grants to Referral Partner a non-transferable, non-exclusive license, without right of sublicense, to distribute the Company Materials exactly as provided to Referral Partner by Company to perform Referral Partner’s obligations under this Agreement.

Ownership. As between Referral Partner and Company, Company retains all right, title, and interest to (a) the Company Marks, (b) the Services, any of its products, material or pre-existing intellectual property rights (c) the high-level description of the Company Products and the Company Materials, and (d) all Intellectual Property Rights related to any of the foregoing. There are no implied licenses under this Agreement.

No Intellectual Property Rights. Parties agree that no intellectual property rights are conceived or developed under this Agreement. If any intellectual property rights are conceived or developed, the intellectual property rights will vest with Company, unless otherwise agreed by the parties.

CONFIDENTIALITY

In connection with this Agreement, “Confidential Information” means all data and information of a confidential nature of Company disclosed by Company to the Referral Partner under this Agreement, as well as information that Referral Partner knows or reasonably should know that the Company regards as confidential, including business practices, software, technical information, future product/services plans, programming/design techniques or plans, know-how, trade secrets, prospects, customers, end users suppliers, development plans or projects, and services. Confidential Information may be communicated orally, in writing, or in any other recorded or tangible form.

Confidentiality. Referral Partner shall maintain in confidence all Confidential Information disclosed to it by the Company. Referral Partner shall not use for any purpose outside the scope of this Agreement, or disclose to any third party such Confidential Information except as expressly authorized by this Agreement. To the extent that disclosure is authorized by this Agreement, the Referral Partner shall obtain prior agreement from its employees, contractors, agents, and consultants to whom disclosure is to be made to hold in confidence and not make use of such information for any purpose other than those permitted by this Agreement. Referral Partner shall use at least the same standard of care as it uses to protect its own most confidential information (and in no event less than reasonable care) to ensure that such employees, contractors, agents, and consultants do not disclose or make any unauthorized use of such Confidential Information. Referral Partner shall promptly notify the other upon discovery of any unauthorized use or disclosure of the Confidential Information. Notwithstanding any other provision in this Agreement to the contrary, the obligations set forth in this section 7 shall survive any termination or expiration of this Agreement for perpetuity.

Exceptions. The obligations of confidentiality contained in this section 7 shall not apply to the extent that it can be established by the Referral Partner by competent proof that such Confidential Information:

was already known to the Referral Partner, other than under an obligation of confidentiality, at the time of disclosure by the Company;

was generally available to the public or was otherwise part of the public domain at the time of its disclosure to the Referral Partner;

became generally available to the public or otherwise became part of the public domain after its disclosure, other than through any act or omission of the Referral Partner in breach of this Agreement; or

was disclosed to the receiving Party, other than under an obligation of confidentiality, by a third party who had no obligation not to disclose such information to others.

Authorized Disclosure. Notwithstanding any provision to the contrary, the Referral Partner may disclose Confidential Information (a) to the extent required by law or any governmental authority, or (b) on a “need to know” basis under an obligation of confidentiality to its legal counsel or accountants, provided, that such Referral Partner shall to the extent practicable (and except to the extent it would jeopardize the filing or prosecution of letters patent) use commercially reasonable efforts to assist the Company in securing confidential treatment of such information required to be disclosed. Prior to disclosing any Confidential Information under this section 7 Referral Partner shall take reasonable steps to give the Company sufficient notice of the disclosure request for the Company to contest the disclosure request.

Referral Partner shall indemnify, defend, and hold Company harmless from and against any and all liabilities, losses, damages, costs, fees, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys’ fees) resulting from or arising out of any Claims based on allegations that (a) Referral Partner breached any obligations including with limitation Confidential Information, representation or warranty contained herein, or has breached any applicable laws, rules and regulations, or (b) Referral Partner made a representation or warranty regarding Company or the Services that is inconsistent with the written high-level description of Services provided to Referral Partner by Company, or is otherwise unauthorized by Company.

Indemnification Procedure. An indemnifying party hereunder shall be liable for any costs and damages to third parties incurred by the other party which are attributable to any such Claims, provided that such other party (i) notifies the indemnifying party promptly in writing of the claim, (ii) gives the indemnifying party the sole authority to defend, compromise or settle the claim, with prior approval of the Company and (iii) provides all available information, assistance, and authority at the indemnifying party’s reasonable request and at the indemnifying party’s reasonable expense to enable the indemnifying party to defend, compromise, or settle such claim. Any indemnifying party hereunder shall diligently pursue any defense required to be rendered hereunder, shall keep the indemnified party informed of all significant developments in any action defended by the indemnified party, and shall not enter into any settlement affecting the indemnified party’s interests without the prior consent of the indemnified party.

LIMITATION OF LIABILITY

COMPANY SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO REFERRAL PARTNER OR ANY THIRD PARTY FOR ANY INDIRECT DAMAGES INCLUDING TOWARDS COSTS OF PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS, LOST PROFITS OR ANY OTHER SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL OR INDIRECT DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED, AND WHETHER BASED ON CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), PRODUCTS LIABILITY OR ANY OTHER THEORY OF LIABILITY, REGARDLESS OF WHETHER COMPANY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. NOTWITHSTANDING ANYTHING TO THE CONTRARY, THE MAXIMUM AGGREGATE LIABILITY OF COMPANY FOR DIRECT DAMAGES FOR ANY REASON SHALL BE LIMITED TO AMOUNTS PAID BY COMPANY IN RESPECT OF THE QUALIFYING SALE . THESE LIMITATIONS WILL APPLY NOTWITHSTANDING THE FAILURE OF THE ESSENTIAL PURPOSE OF ANY REMEDY.

NON-SOLICITATION OF PERSONNEL

The Referral Partner shall not engage or hire as an employee or engage as independent contractor, Company’ s employees or independent contractors during the term of this Agreement and for a period of one (1) year following expiration or termination of this Agreement except as may be mutually agreed in writing.

TERM AND TERMINATION:

Term. The term of this Agreement shall be one (1) year from the Effective Date unless terminated earlier in accordance with the provisions of this Section. This Agreement shall renew automatically for additional one-year terms unless one Party provides the other written notice no later than thirty (30) days prior to the expiration of the then-current term of the Agreement of its intention to allow the Agreement to expire at the end of such term.

Termination for Breach. Either Party may terminate this Agreement for cause resulting from the material breach of this Agreement by the other Party by providing the breaching party written notice of such material breach and the intention to terminate for cause. The Party receiving such notice shall have thirty (30) days to cure such material breach. If at the end of such thirty (30) day period, the breach has not been cured to the reasonable satisfaction of the Party seeking to terminate the Agreement, the Agreement shall terminate.

Termination for Convenience. Either Party may terminate this Agreement for convenience upon ninety (90) days’ written notice.

Effect of Termination; Duties of the Parties Upon Termination. Upon any termination or expiration of this Agreement, Referral Partner shall (a) refrain thereafter from representing itself as a promoter or marketer of Company Products, or as a referral partner of Company, (b) immediately cease all use of any Company Marks, and (c) return to Company the Company materials and Confidential Information and all tangible items in Referral Partner’s possession or under its control containing Confidential Information of Company. Upon any termination or expiration of this Agreement, Company shall return to Referral Partner all tangible items in Company’s possession or under its control containing Referral Partner’s Confidential Information. Upon any termination or expiration of this Agreement, all licenses granted under this Agreement shall terminate.

Survival. Any clauses which by their very nature survive termination of the Agreement, will survive.

MISCELLANEOUS:

Construction. The Parties have participated jointly in the negotiation and drafting of this Agreement. In the event an ambiguity or question of intent or interpretation arises, this Agreement shall be construed as if drafted jointly by the Parties and no presumption or burden of proof shall arise favoring or disfavoring any Party by virtue of the authorship of any of the provisions of this Agreement. As used in this Agreement, the singular shall include the plural and vice versa, and the terms “include” and “including” shall be deemed to be immediately followed by the phrase “without limitation.” The captions and headings in this Agreement are inserted for convenience and reference only and in no way define or limit the scope or content of this Agreement and shall not affect the interpretation of its provisions.

Governing Law and Dispute Resolution: This Agreement will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the India, without reference to its conflict-of-laws principles. The Parties shall resolve any difference or dispute arises out of this Agreement by way of negotiations. If such negotiation process fails, then all disputes arising from or related to this Agreement shall be resolved before exclusive jurisdiction of courts in Pune, India.

NOTICES: All notices including hereunder shall be given in writing by hand delivery, courier service or email at the addresses set forth below:

If to Company

If to REFERRAL PARTNER

Attention: Sanjay Ghare

Email: [email protected]

Address: 3rd Floor, Amar Tech Centre, Sakore Nagar, Viman Nagar, Pune, Maharashtra 411014

Non-Waiver: A party's failure or delay in enforcing any provision of the Agreement will not be deemed a waiver of that party's rights with respect to that provision or any other provision of the Agreement. A party's waiver of any of its rights under the Agreement is not a waiver of any of its other rights with respect to a prior, contemporaneous or future occurrence, whether similar in nature or not.

Captions: The captions in the Agreement are not part of the Agreement, but are for the convenience of the parties. References to Sections are to sections of this Agreement.

Counterparts. Any documents signed in connection with the Agreement may be signed in multiple counterparts, which taken together will constitute one original.

Severability: In the event any term of the Agreement is held unenforceable by a court having jurisdiction, the remaining portion of the Agreement will remain in full force and effect, provided that the Agreement without the unenforceable provision(s) is consistent with the material economic incentives of the parties leading to the Agreement.

Relationship between the Parties. The relationship of Referral Partner and Company is that of independent contractors. Regardless of the use of the word "partner" in the title of this Agreement, neither Party is, nor shall be deemed to be, a partner, joint venturer, agent, or legal representative of the other Party for any purpose. Neither Party shall be entitled to enter into any contracts in the name of or on behalf of the other Party, and neither Party shall be entitled to pledge the credit of the other Party in any way or hold itself out as having authority to do so. No Party shall incur any debts or make any commitments for the other, except to the extent, if at all, explicitly provided herein.

Assignment. Referral Partner shall not assign or transfer this Agreement, in whole or in part, whether by operation of law or otherwise, or delegate any of its obligations hereunder, without the express written consent of Company. Subject to the foregoing, this Agreement shall be binding upon the successors and permitted assigns of the Parties. Any assignment in violation of the foregoing shall constitute a material breach of this Agreement and shall be null and void.

Force Majeure. Neither Party shall be liable for any failure or delay in fulfilling the terms of this Agreement due to fire, strike, war, civil unrest, terrorist action, government regulations, acts of nature or other causes which are unavoidable and beyond the reasonable control of the Party claiming force majeure.

Entire Agreement. The Agreement constitutes and contains the complete, final and exclusive understanding and agreement of the Parties and cancels and supersedes any and all prior negotiations, correspondence, understandings, and agreements, whether oral or written, between the Parties respecting the subject matter thereof. Parties agree that, their engagement with each other is on non-exclusive basis and either Party is free to appoint any third party for performance of their respective obligations.

Electronic Record. This Agreement is an electronic record in the form of an electronic contract formed under Information Technology Act, 2000 and rules made thereunder and the amended provisions pertaining to electronic documents / records in various statutes as amended by the Information Technology Act, 2000. This Agreement does not require any physical, electronic or digital signature. This Agreement constitutes a legally binding document between the Subscriber and the Company.

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Referer's Information:

Referral information:, referral details:.

Pravin Mahadik

Chief Financial Officer

Pravin Bandu Mahadik is an ICMAI fellow and accomplished Cost and Management Accountant (CMA) with over a decade of experience in accounts and finance.

As a leader, Pravin has worked across various financial domains, including commercial operations, accounts and finance, auditing, taxation, MIS, transfer pricing, and export management.

He consistently introduces and implements systems to fortify financial control and improve Vervotech’s net organizational efficiency.

Marvel Puri

Chief Revenue Officer

As chief revenue officer (CRO), Marvel is responsible for every process at Vervotech that generates revenue. He has been instrumental in connecting different revenue-related functions, from sales, customer success, pricing, and revenue operations. His focus-driven approach to improving sales performance, and creating great product and pricing strategy, and delivering customer satisfaction has helped Vervotech to acquire 100 clients within a short stint of 2 years.    

With the experience of over 15+ years in sales and business development at SaaS-based organizations, Marvel has flourished throughout his career by creating and leading experienced and diverse teams. To Marvel, growth has not only been to hit quotas but is broad and holistic: open new paths to revenue and build the processes to get there.

Ganesh Pawade

Ganesh is a Problem Solver and a Thought Leader. Throughout his 13 yrs professional journey, he helped businesses to identify their platform areas, define solutions and architecture, and make a more technically-informed decision on their current and future business as well as the technology roadmap.

His passion for good code often results in him being engaged in animated discussions with his team of architects and engineers, pushing them to think beyond what is possible. His specialties include Solution Architecture, Full stack specialist, AWS, Azure and Google cloud.

Dharmendra Ladi

Dharmendra Ladi has been instrumental in positioning Vervotech as the “World’s Best Mapping Provider” and is focused on transforming how the industry presents accommodation data to its customers. With his 14+ years of experience in travel and innovative technologies, he is the principal architect behind designing Vervotech’s AI-driven products that are today helping its clients worldwide do business seamlessly.    

He leads new product development. Under his leadership, Vervotech has is credited with going from 0 to 100 customers within 2 years of business establishment. Dharmendra is also an inspiring thought leader, and regularly speaks at large scale events, webinars and has been interviewed by multiple media houses.

Sanjay Ghare

CEO & MD

Sanjay brings over 16+ years of entrepreneurial, general management, and senior executive experience with proven expertise in business development, corporate strategy, and product & program management. Sanjay, being an Industry veteran, and an influencer, leads and drives Vervotech’s vision of “Organizing World’s Accommodation Data.” Before he founded Vervotech, he was a VP of Tavisca Solutions, where he took the started SaaS division and grown with customers in  more than 15 countries.    

With his business acumen, Sanjay is on the trajectory of revolutionizing the accommodation data segment. He’s also a member of the Forbes Technology Council and often puts actionable growth strategies into perspective in his Forbes column.       

Anurag Mittal

Chief Marketing Officer

Anurag Mittal is a seasoned technology executive who has led multiple marketing teams at SaaS-based organizations. At Vervotech, Anurag is responsible for marketing and strategy formulation and setting up a growth-oriented marketing & prospecting team. Anurag comes with an experience working with Organizations like Deloitte and ACCELQ, where he led the marketing initiatives for their SaaS product lines and has worn many hats including devising marketing strategies for business growth, managing GTM with alliances and partners, conceptualizing and orchestrating marketing campaigns, end-to-end event management, and demand generation activities to deliver a qualified sales pipeline.    

He has been strategic face for the launch of Vervotech’s website and digital presence and have led several winning campaigns that has led to successful brand development and customer acquisition.    

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Rohit Shukla

Chief Product Officer

As Vervotech’s Chief Product Officer, Rohit is responsible for the product strategy and teams working to advance Vevotech’s position as a leading accommodation data company for OTAs, bed banks, DMCs, and Tour operators.

Rohit has been in the technology space for the last 15+ years, working with companies at different stages of growth within Travel, E-commerce, and FinTech Industries. In his previous roles, he drove product strategies for start-ups and SMEs and was instrumental in building platforms and product lines that generated $900 million in revenues and half a million paid customers. The products included flights, hotels, car rentals, activities & vacation packages.

Archana Garg

Financial Advisor

Archana has more than 15 years of experience in finance and operations management. Archana is proven leader in building and scaling companies as a result of her focus on financial strategy and operational excellence. She is motivated by understanding the customers she serves, and providing value at all levels of a business while building strong relationships with her colleagues.

She is a Chartered Accountant and is responsible for driving the Vervotech’s overall financial strategy, including the growth plans. Her experience navigating high growth companies, developing new business strategies and overall operational mindset delivers meaningful results for growth stage of Vervotech.

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Travel agencies’ digital dilemma

IN an age when practically anyone with a smartphone, a stable Internet connection and a credit card can book a flight and hotel room on his own and personalize his itinerary, it seems that travel agencies are no longer useful. Indeed, stories revolving around their decline abound, and it’s not unusual to encounter headlines containing the words “death” and “dying.” But are they really on the verge of permanent obsolescence?

In western countries like the U.S., where technological advancements are embraced much more rapidly than in less developed nations, travel agencies are actually thriving. According to the online research company Statista, the American travel agency industry is predicted to generate $17.3 billion in revenue in 2020, up from $15.5 billion in 2015. And its profit-to-revenue ratio is estimated to have increased twofold from 6% roughly a decade ago to 12% by 2015.

It’s no different here. In the 2009 Survey of Tourism Establishments in the Philippines (STEP) for Transport Operators, Tour and Travel Agencies of the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), there were only 864 establishments engaged in activities of tour and travel agencies. In PSA’s 2014 STEP, the number shot up to 1,532. Revenue of the agencies also rose. The 2009 STEP showed that transport operators, tour and travel agencies made P164.5 billion. In the latest STEP, their revenue reached P229.6 billion.

The Philippine Travel Agencies Association (PTAA), a group established in 1979 to foster unity in the travel industry and promote the welfare of its members and the traveling public, has been seeing its membership grow every year, its president, Marlene Dado Jante, told BusinessWorld in an interview. There are currently 623 travel agencies that belong to PTAA. In January of this year alone, the association inducted 18 new members.

The increase is even more astonishing considering that PTAA has strict requirements like physical office in a commercial area. In addition, Ms. Jante said, “You need to show that you are actually paying government taxes.”

Online travel agencies

It’s no doubt an encouraging development, but travel agencies, particularly the brick-and-mortar ones, are still facing threat, not from their perceived uselessness by the public but from their digital brethren, online travel agencies (OTAs) like Expedia. “We admit that OTAs are really our competitors,” Ms. Jante said. “That’s why we have to do better.”

In a 2014 survey of 3,500 American leisure travelers (and 1,500 business travelers) conducted by Google, one in three chose to transact with OTAs for their superior site tools and options. The other reasons that they had for booking on OTAs: lower prices/better deals, past positive experience or recommendations for the site, existence of loyalty/rewards programs, and prominence in Google search results.

According to Ms. Jante, traditional travel agents have their own advantage: their superior knowledge of tourist destinations. “If you come to me and say you want to go hiking or mountain climbing, we know the place” to recommend, she said. Travel agents, like all members of PTAA, are constantly sharpening their touristic knowledge. “Travel agents continue to have and attend trainings and familiarization tours,” she said. “We go to a lot of places.”

Traditional travel agents have also started to focus more on corporate accounts. “We do group tours,” Ms. Jante said. “And I believe that OTAs cannot do that.” She went on to say that those tours include pre-departure briefing that includes information about which specific places are best to visit and warnings about which places are best to avoid.

At the end of the day, Ms. Jante emphasized, “Computers do not talk. We talk.” And having someone to talk to in case of an emergency while on a trip abroad can be life-saving. Ms. Jante, who runs her own travel agency, Queenspoint Travel & Tours Corp., always keeps her phone within reach in case someone needs her help. “I see to it that I’m ready to take calls anytime,” she said, even in the dead of the night.

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This is a title, online travel agency stops account takeover and scraping bot attacks.

- Infrastructure Lead

• Accurate bot protection : Bot Defender uses behavioral analysis, machine learning and predictive methods to detect and mitigate scraping and ATO attacks in real time.
• Preserved functionality of good bots:  The leading OTA works with a large number of business partners that use automation, so being able to discover and whitelist the unknown good bot traffic was extremely important for the business.
• Easy integration: Bot Defender’s open architecture allowed it to integrate easily with the OTA’s existing infrastructure. This enabled fast deployment and quick results.
• Low-latency: Bot Defender is designed for low latency, which reduces the load on the OTA’s web infrastructure. This preserved website performance and Google page rankings. 
• Always-available security expertise: HUMAN offers best-in-class service and security analyst insights via Slack, email or phone.

Bot Defender identified that, on average, more than half of the OTA’s traffic came from unwanted bots. That number jumped to 95% of the traffic on login pages. As Bot Defender mitigated the malicious bots, the OTA quickly saw the following results:

• Improved website performance : The low latency architecture and reduction in bot traffic improved response time by up to 200ms — over 50% faster.  In addition, the number of bot-related production outages on the OTA’s website dropped to zero.
• Reduction of business and infrastructure costs : The OTA saved significantly on GDS fees and other third-party costs due to a more than 12% reduction in API calls to these services. The CPU utilization on web servers also dropped by 25%, lowering infrastructure costs. 
• Improved look-to-book ratio : Once Bot Defender cleaned up the OTA’s web data, their look-to-book ratio was no longer skewed low due to scraping bots. The team gained confidence that A/B testing results were accurate, allowing them to make smarter decisions about pricing and promotions.
• Strengthened consumer trust: The efficient blocking of ATO attacks provided a safer user experience and reduced calls to customer service. The improved site performance also made for a more frictionless buyer journey.

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