TRANSPORT

Virtually all tours include transport as part of the tour package. Transport for tours comes in many forms and may include air, car, train, motor-coach, or ship to name the most common forms. More exotic modes of transportation might be found on adventure tours including riding an elephant or llama or a dug-out canoe.

Frequently, modes of transport may combine or used sequentially to achieve the objectives of the tour. For example, there are fly/drive tours that use a combination of aeroplanes and rental cars. Some tours offer fly/cruise packages, wherein the travelers fly to a port of embarkation and then board a cruise ship for most of the tour.

Other commonly identified types of tour feature the name of dominant mode of transport. For example, a rail tour is a tour whose primary mode of transport during the tour is by train. Perhaps the most widely recognized form of touring is the motor-coach tour, which as the name implies, utilizes buses to move participants from destination to destination and to visit sightseeing attraction along the way.

Included in transport are transfers, which are any mode of transport that shuttles participants from their point of arrival, frequently an airport, to the first accommodation, typically a hotel. Transfer, however, are not limited to transport between airports and hotels. Virtually any type of transfer is possible, such as a shuttle bus between a railway station and cruise ship.

Now we will focus on certain commonly used modes of transport, which are air, car, and motor-coach or bus and some industry language related to each one.

Air transport

The travel agents have two main types of air to choices from when he or she arranged to the tour package; the IATA`s scheduled airline which is regulary follows the rules of International Air Transport Association and the other are called non scheduled airlines.

Non-shcheduled airlines may be further divided into two type:

Low-cost carrier

A low-cost carrier or low-cost airline also known as a no-frills or discount carrier is an airline that offers generally low fares in exchange for eliminating many traditional passenger services. While the term is often applied to any carrier with a low ticket prices and limited services.

Charter flight

Travel agencies could contract with any airline for the complete and exclusive use of an aircraft. The term often refers to flights operated by tour companies to resort or popular holiday destinations during high season.

Vehicles and Car rental

There are three typical situations that may occur in your daily work. They characterize the three main reasons for renting a car:

• Commercial/business
• Leisure/social
• Replacement

Vehicles and vehicle codes

As you know, the travel industry relies upon a system of codes as a method of abbreviating names or concepts. Car bookings also rely on codes. Vehicle type codes provide an easy and efficient way to identify and label the many different types, sizes, and classes of vehicles available for hire.

Vehicle codes

The car codes are created by selecting one character from each column and combining them into a 4 character car code. These codes are an international standard and are universally used by all global distribution systems (GDS) as well as in car rental documents such as vouchers

Buses & motor-coaches

Buses are usually used for urban and suburban scheduled travel where the level of comfort is not expected to be high and where at peak hours passengers might even have to stand.

Coaches, on the other hand, are usually much more comfortable and used for regional or cross-country journeys. There are generally different levels of bus and coach service quality in every country, from virtually comfortless vehicles to excellent, air conditioned buses with steward service, catering, video, etc.