American Business and Holiday Travel

I work at a hotel and I’m trying to think of creative ways to impress guests.

If you were staying at a hotel, what would impress you or make you say WOW, i never would have expected that!

Or just about anything that you’d wish a hotel would do for you to anticipate your arrival.

Simple, normal expected things would impress me… not the fresh flowers, fruit, wine , cheese and sweets you find in luxury places. A desk clerk that is neat, professionally dressed, and greets you with a smile and perhaps offers you a mini map of the city if you are a new visitor. I am impressed with a desk clerk who greets me by name. I am always impressed with a desk clerk who explains where my room is and even draws a rough map instead of giving me a key and letting me fend for myself. I am impressed by a desk clerk who takes the time to answer my questions whether they are about a nearby restaurant or something similar. Although I am able to carry my bags, it is always nice to have someone offer to do that if I need help. I am impressed with neat and clean hallways and common areas. I am impressed with a spotless, quiet room that does not smell of smoke. In the room, it is always good to have a map of the area, a list of all the nearby restaurants and scenic attractions with their addresses and hours. If the room has a little coffee maker, a tiny ice box and a microwave and even an iron and ironing board, I am thrilled, but obviously these are expensive items to put in every room. Although little shampoos and lotions are nice, they are not a necessity. A spotless bathroom and bedroom are. Sometimes, it is great to go into the hotel common area and relax over free cup of coffee or tea in the morning. Having a desk clerk ask me when I come down the next morning or I am going out that night whether my room was OK and if there was anything more I needed pampers me a lot and is appreciated. In all, the desk clerk to a great extent, determines whether or not I am impressed with the hotel. Have stayed in some simple hotels and have been pleased and have stayed in some plus hotels and have not wanted to return. A new hotel patron can come back time after time or recommend the hotel to others if it is a pleasant place to stay. My comments would be to make my stay similar to that of a special friend of yours staying for a day or two, not a stranger who is handed a key and someone at the front desk points him toward his room all the time chatting on the phone with a friend.

I want to know the steps in starting a travel agency,who is in charge of giving permission,who gives licence to start a travel agency in Kerala,please reply.

Rules of Practice and Procedure (which follow in their entirety) is designed to assist the agent who may be unfamiliar with either the Travel Agent Arbiter Program or the arbitration process, or both. It is not meant to be a substitute for the Rules, but merely a starting point for the uninitiated.

I want to visit Ireland in October, and prices right now seem to hover around $900 based on several of the airfare search sites (expedia, orbitz, travelocity). Is that a reasonable price, or should I wait it out a bit and possibly get a better deal?
Flying from Phoenix.

im flying from lax and paid 995 for a ticket. i searched and searched and that was the best deal by far! with fuel prices going up i wanted to book asap before airlines start charging extra to compensate. try travelpapa.com

I am looking for a cruise to take my son and daughter on, ages 14 and 17. They want to sea Alaska, and I would like to leave from Seattle, because it is in the US. I am wondering what the best cruise line is, that has fun activities such as Kayaking. The trip will be at the beginning of August, so I need to book fast!

At this late date I don’t know if you can find a cabin. If you do all lines offer many different things while most will visit the same ports of call. I have sailed with Norwegian & Princess to Alaska and was completely happy with both lines. Plenty of activities both on the ship & plenty of excursions to choose from. Becauses of security reasons I doubt you will be beable to go. Try calling 1-800-Princess & see what they say.
It is an AMAZING cruise. To really see Alaska for both you & your kids a cruisetour is best with Princess but, they either leave out of or end in Vancouver.
Good Luck.

so many choices (embry riddle, daniel webster ect) i need a great college that specializes in aviation, thats also cheap. i want to get a BS in aeronautical science, but i need to save money. give me the best, cheapest school

University of North Dakota is probably the best overall. It’s not cheap, but none of them are. The flight costs are going to be the same everywhere, but since UND is a public school, the tuition is going to be lower and still providing top notch aviation training. Another option is The University of Minnesota at Crookston (I graduated from there). It is very near UND, and they have a partnership in the aviation program. UND does the flight training and U of M is the degree granting institution. Smaller school individual attention combined with bigger school flight training. It is really the best of both worlds.

Do you trust this kind of web site ?

I have used TripAdvisor quite often and have found it to be very useful and truthful. It is nice way to cut through all of the b.s. that some hotels/attractions use to attract their customers and instead rely on a variety of opinions of people who have already experienced it and can give a realistic view(of course you have to watch out for the occasional reviewer who loves/hates everything regardless of quality)

I might be going there for a couple of years to work, and I was wondering legally how many vacations days per year do people get in New Zealand? Is it 10 business days?

there are 11 statutory holidays:
jan 1
jan 2 (new years day)
feb 14 (waitangi day)
april (second weekend, fri, sun mon: easter)
april 25 (anzac day)
june 6 (queens birthday)
oct? (labour day, it varies)
dec 25
dec 26 (christmas)

and each province has a stat day too, apart from that new zealand now has four weeks annual leave that equals 8% of your annual pay.

all up thats up to 11 stat days and 20 working days a years. (the stat day may fall in the weekend and only a few are transferred to the closest mon or fri)

hope that helps

I am planning a vacation December 6-12 to Maldives. I would like to stay at the Maldives Hilton Resort (yes, I know very pricey) but wanted to see if anyone has traveled there and if that is the best deal compared to other resorts on the island. What other recommendations would you make?

First, you should know it is going through a name change — to the Conrad. Look for some promotions on this change for year end 2007.

All reports back on the Hilton have been positive at TripAdvisor.

Hi, i’m trying to find the cheapest airfare to visit a friend from march 20th to march 27th. i would like to buy the tickets when they’re at their lowest, and the prices im seeing now are (i think) a little high. My question is, are the prices higher to buy an airline ticket around the holidays regardless of when you’re flying? If i wait until say, January (after the holiday season) to buy the tickets, will I get a better price? Thanks!

Off season tickets are generally cheaper. Off days like Tuesdays are also cheaper. Sometimes buying a ticket too far in advance can actually work against you. One of the services I use is by Travelocity. It is called Farewatcher Plus. With this service you can set it to alert you when the designated cities you are interested in have a change in fares. You set the amounts. So say for instance you want to know when a fare changes by $50–you will get an email alert letting you know.

This is a great service for two reasons- one it helps you get an idea, over a period of time, what the normal fares are. Then when there is a deal, you will know it is really a deal and you can jump on it. And you do have to act fast when you get the alert because the number of seats is limited for that special fare.

The other way to save is their Last Minute deals. If you wit til the very last week, sometimes you can get great last minute deals if things are slow.

I set my alert for $25 and have an alert set for 6 different airports I frequent. It has been a great service for five years now. Give it a try. i hope this helps.

My friend and I want to go on a trip to Las Vegas, Bahamas, or Florida. Where can we find cheap vacation packages that include hotel as well as the flight?

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