STA Travel (STA Travel)

Member Name: The Duke

Product:	STA Travel
Date:	08/01/08 (265 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Helpful staff, good website

Disadvantages: Extra fees, student-focussed, website prices not matched by walk-in prices

I've used STA Travel probably around three or four times over the course of the last six years. I first encountered them in 2002 when I was taking an extended trip to New Zealand as a student. Back then, the staff were extremely helpful, friendly and approachable. I must have sat with the nice girl for the best part of two hours as she examined practically every route possible between the London and Auckland to get the best combination of departure and arrival times plus prices. She printed out a lot of quotes and let me leave the office to peruse them at my leisure without any pressure. I went back after an hour of poring over them with a pint in a nearby pub and handed over the £650.

The icing on the cake was the fact the price they eventually quoted me for a British Airways/Qantas code share flight was comparable with the other prices I'd managed to research by myself.

I was also able, while in Auckland, to call in to the local STA branch and change travel details for my return flight home and the staff there were as helpful as they had been in Belfast.

Since then, I'd always used STA for anything that was slightly out of the ordinary or where potential big savings could be made, despite no longer being a student. I've been in to the local branch many times over the years as a starting point for any travelling plans I was trying to put together. To be fair, they weren't always the cheapest, but they've always been very helpful to me and there was never any pressure to buy from them. Compared to the surly reply I got at Trailfinders recently, after waiting 45 minutes to be served, the staff at STA were a breath of fresh air.

The staff can vary (based on my local branch) on what they're prepared to do. For example, a recent query of mine about another flight to New Zealand in 2008 meant that the staff member tried a lot of different flights that might suit, including different inward and outward routes. When I returned to the shop a few days later with further questions, he wasn't present and the staff member that dealt with my query seemed a lot less knowledgeable about what was on offer (although still very helpful). The local branch varies in how busy it is, too. I guess, as a student-focussed agent, they tend to do their business during term-time, but will be quiet during the holiday period. It was certainly quiet over the Christmas period when I was doing my most recent research.

When it came to book this flight to New Zealand, I considered STA, but did a little bit of homework and spoke to a few other travel agents, including Trailfinders (who, while friendly, could only offer me a flight that was £200 more expensive than the STA best price) and I got as fas as dial-a-flight's website, but the lack of flight details was off-putting (I prefer to deal with people in person than over the phone).

I eventually bit the bullet and went into STA, with my quote saved from their website (which I found easy to use and got good results from their search engines). The helpful girl eventually found a flight that had the best price that happened to be the same flight as my printed quote. However, the in-store price was £40 more expensive than the quote I'd had off the internet not an hour earlier.

I still had the option of walking out at that point, but to be honest, while the price change was annoying, I could afford it and had already done a lot of walking around that day. Given the way some travel websites register a search for flights as interest in those flights and drive up prices (people like Easyjet do this), there was no guarantee the price would be £40 cheaper if I booked online from the office/home. The staff member also mentioned that the internet side of STA was sometimes given its own deals and that could be what had happened here. The price was still competitive enough and there was no pressure to continue. The staff member even suggested that I go book online, though I was disappointed there was no offer/attempt to price match the website.

Already a little annoyed, I told the nice girl to go ahead and book the flight. Due to the inability of management and the HR department of my employer to make a decision, final permission to take extended leave had come through a few days later than I would have liked and the flight prices had already climbed £130. I wanted the flights booked in a hurry as I had plenty of other arrangements to make.

When the final price came through, there were yet more charges. An extra six pounds was added for airline failure cover plus a twelve quid fee for speaking to the nice STA girl in person plus 1.5% credit card surcharge plus VAT on the credit card fee. All in all, the flight ended up being around £70 dearer than my quote with the added cost and extra fees (that you can't refuse) which I was less than happy about. I could have walked out at this stage, too, but with time becoming a factor I really didn't want to have to start researching the flights again from scratch or risking further price rises.

At this point, the STA travel insurance was offered. It was around £62 for the silver policy and £67 for the gold. The girl advised that insurance was taken out and when I suggested I'd shop around. There was no pressure to buy, only a plea to definitely get sorted with insurance. It turns out that I saw plenty of comparable policies on the internet for around £35.

This has definitely taken some of the shine off my opinion of STA and though part of the frustration was the price increase due my employers inability to make a simple decision quickly, I think I would still have been peeved had the flights been £130 cheaper and the extra fees applied. I think that seventy quid's worth of extra fees and charges is a bit out of order, to be perfectly honest. That they don't price match their own website is a little confusing (and annoying) too, but they are still friendly, they aim to help and most of the time they succeed.

I daresay that I'll go use them again, but I'll be sure to make all my bookings over the internet if they turn out to be the most competitive.

Summary: Student-focussed, competitive travel agent with good service levels