What I Learned About Booking Air While Earning My Centrav Air Specialist Certificate
When I started Tradecraft Travel and started working toward my Centrav Air Specialist certificate, I assumed airfare would be the least interesting part of travel advising. After all, everyone can search flights online. I considered myself a master using tools like Google Flights. What I didn’t expect was how many half-truths and outdated assumptions surround airline booking. The training forced me to separate myth from reality, and a few things genuinely surprised me.
Myth #1: Travel advisors always have cheaper air than consumers
This one is easy to overstate, and it’s simply not true in all cases. For many domestic U.S. flights, consumers can often find fares that are comparable to what an advisor sees. Travel agencies used to rely on airline bookings for most of their profit, but with the rise of the Internet airlines largely stopped paying commissions about 20 years ago. Airlines have done an excellent job pushing simple point-to-point domestic routes directly to travelers, and for a straightforward round-trip with no complications, booking direct can be perfectly sensible.
What I learned, though, is where that comparison breaks down. International itineraries, open-jaw tickets, complex routings, and stopovers can be a different story. In these cases, advisors often have access to consolidator fares, contract pricing, or routings that don’t surface cleanly in consumer search engines. Sometimes the savings are modest; sometimes they are significant. Just as important, the rules attached to those fares are often more flexible than they appear at first glance.
My search tools are certainly better now that I am a professional travel advisor.
Myth #2: Advisors just “push” air to make commission
Any travel agency building its business plan around air sales is akin to me opening a Blockbuster. Air is not where most advisors make their living, and the coursework made that very clear. The real value of advisor-booked air is not squeezing out ten dollars in savings—it’s risk management. Fare rules, change penalties, reissue procedures, minimum connection times, and interline agreements matter enormously when something goes wrong. Online booking engines rarely explain those nuances well.
One of the strongest takeaways from the training was how much happens after the ticket is issued. When flights are delayed, rerouted, or canceled, knowing which airline controls the ticket, who has reissue authority, and how protected a connection really is can make the difference between a minor inconvenience and a trip-ending problem.
Myth #3: Booking direct with airlines is always safer
Booking direct can be a good choice, and sometimes it truly is the best option. But “direct” does not automatically mean “protected.” I learned how certain third-party and airline bookings can leave travelers exposed on multi-carrier itineraries, especially internationally. An advisor can often structure the same trip in a way that improves protection across airlines—or at least makes the accepted risks clearer before the ticket is purchased.
That transparency is key. At Tradecraft Travel, I will tell you when you are better off booking directly with the airline. Sometimes that’s the honest answer, and I don’t see that as a failure of advising. It’s key to it.
Niche fares still matter
One area in which I was less experienced before the training was niche pricing. Student fares, cruise-aligned air, and certain negotiated international rates still exist, but they require knowing where—and how—to look. These fares don’t always appear in consumer searches, and they often come with conditions that make them ideal for specific travelers. The Centrav program emphasized matching the fare to the traveler, not just chasing the lowest headline price.