Advisors ask me about service fees more than almost anything else: whether to charge one, how much, and when. I hear it from brand-new advisors and from people booking seven figures a year, and after 20-plus years in the business, the answer has never been clearer. Here’s what I tell them.
The first booking is always free
Tell your prospective client: “I normally charge a concierge fee, and I’m waiving it for your first trip with me.” Naming your fee tells them your time has value. Waiving it builds trust and gets you the business.
Think about what a great first trip turns into. The honeymoon becomes an anniversary trip, then a family spring break, and somewhere along the way a college roommate hears about you at a dinner party and calls. And commission pays you on every one of those bookings. A couple-hundred-dollar fee that scares someone off before that first trip can cost you thousands more in lost business down the line.
One more thing here, because I like data more than gut feelings. Fora’s Client Leads Program matches new travelers with an advisor through a trip inquiry form on our website, and we recently changed it to waive the fee for anyone using a Fora advisor for the first time. Before that change, 18% of people dropped off right at the part of the form that mentioned fees. Since the change, that number is 4%. Win rates and close rates (the percentage who actually become clients) for those leads haven’t budged. Same advisors, same success rates, but a lot more people making it through the door.
Charge for concierge work, not planning
Anyone can pull together a list of hotels and an itinerary from Claude in a few minutes now—and honestly, some of the suggestions are pretty decent. So skip the planning fee. Instead, charge for what nobody can do on their own: the table at a restaurant with a three-month waitlist, spa appointments locked in before the good slots vanish, a driver confirmed in three different cities, theater tickets to the hottest show in town (and a personalized rec for a great bar for a pre-show drink nearby).
I’m picky about the wording here, too. A concierge fee (rather than a service fee) tells your client exactly what they’re paying for and makes it instantly clear the additional services you provide.
Match your fees to your service
Some advisors deliver client care that goes well beyond basic hotel bookings—the kind of white-glove experience where the client doesn’t have to worry about anything because everything is taken care of and organized down to a tee.
Say you’re a seasoned advisor planning a week in France for a client. Besides the hotels and transfers, that might include a dinner reservation every night in Paris; a beach club booked for their day in Saint-Tropez; a vineyard visit with a private wine tasting; a personal shopper who knows their style, recommended and reserved before they even board the plane. Delivering all that goes above and beyond, and if that’s the experience you provide, go ahead and charge for that level of concierge support.
If you’re newer to travel advising, move more cautiously. Your first clients are deciding whether working with an advisor is worth it at all, and you’re still honing your skills. The strongest case you can make is a flawless trip. Grow the service first and the fees will follow. When they do, waive the first one anyway—then make the second trip impossible to resist.
The world of travel is changing, and while I firmly believe that the trust and taste of an expert travel advisor matters more than ever, these days winning the business from a new client requires more flexibility. A ChatGPT-generated itinerary may not be perfect, but it does plant a bigger seed of doubt in the mind of a traveler who hasn’t historically used an advisor.
As an industry, we need to acknowledge the change and adapt to be sure that we’re providing a welcoming on-ramp to how wonderful an advisor can be, not turning people away with service fees when they don’t yet understand the service.
