Cape Town ITC, Vanessa Frankal responded to the Travel News Salary Survey results for March, here.
Dear Editor
I was very sad to read the salaries story in Travel News.
I got into booking repatriation flights last July, and somewhere along the line became a bit of a ‘specialist’ in Australia, in terms of people emigrating there from SA, and now, people stranded anywhere globally, trying to get there.
Revenue-wise, I am probably up on last year’s figures, month on month, but only since October last year. I am working with my colleague Agent B – we are both ITCs working under the same brand. She initially discovered the gap in the market and then was magnanimous enough to share the information with me, and so together we forged a way to get people home, a route that other agents hadn’t cottoned on to yet. Then we joined a WhatsApp group for SA travellers trying to get back to Australia, and the rest, as they say, is history.
It’s been an absolute lifeline, as I had ploughed through all my savings and had got my first letter of warning from my home loan provider, due to my being unable to pay my bond.
So it was literally a sink-or-swim scenario, ‘do or die’, but the risk of going off on this tangent paid off. I also won second place in a competition where a client had nominated me. This was the ‘Shining Light Award’ for businesses that had pivoted during COVID. That was a real honour for me and gave me the motivation to do even better.
With the prize money I took myself on a local road trip to the Drakensberg and I spent it all and more on local tourism and showing support to shops and people every day of my trip. It warmed my heart to see how busy local hotels and restaurants were.
I have been very mindful of the day-to-day situation people are in and so I give back as much as possible, wherever I can, because giving back has always been a firm belief of mine.
