Welcome to I. T. S. Travel/DiscountAir.com.
I. T. S. is a fully licensed and insured travel
agency which is family owned and operated. In business
for over 25 years, I. T. S. was one of the first
(if not the first) air consolidator to go on the
Internet in 1995. The company is run by Stephen
Hetherington who has been in the travel industry
for 12 years with a degree in Information Technolgy
and Masters of Business from Keller Graduate School.
If you are not familiar with the terms
"airfare consolidator",or "wholesale airfares"
let us try to explain. Because we sell a tremendous
amount of airline tickets, certain airlines are
willing to give us special fare contracts to promote
their airline. These fares are "unpublished" fares
as opposed to the "published" fares which every
travel agency has and which the airlines will quote
to you when you call them directly. The "unpublished"
fares we sell range between 10 to 50% cheaper than
the "published fares. Most of the business we do
involves international travel to Europe, Africa,
the Middle East, Asia, Latin America and the South
Pacific. The tickets we sell are on your regularly
scheduled airlines, not a third world carrier. We
are not allowed to advertise the name of these airlines
and can only reveal the name when you contact us.
We try to give you a clue to the airline by giving
you its hub city. For example, flights to Latin
America connect through Houston and flights to Europe
connect through Zurich or Frankfurt. We do not deal
with charter airlines, we do not buy bulk seats
and try to resell them. We sell you these seats
only if the space is available.
People frequently ask us why do the
airlines "secretly" sell their tickets at lower
prices and why do they only do it through special
agencies. The answers are relatively simple. The
airlines give us special fares to fill otherwise
empty seats. The best analogy is your supermarket.
If they don't sell a can of soup today they will
sell it tomorrow and make a profit. Not so with
the airline. When that plane takes off with an empty
seat, that profit is gone forever. So it is better
for them to get something for the seat rather than
nothing. That does not mean we only sell last minute
seats, but we will explain that later. The airlines
make most of their money by selling from their published
fares, so they don't want to lose that profit by
reducing fares overall to the general public. So
another analogy is in order. Just as many manufacturers
have out-of-the-way factory outlet stores to sell
their overstocks and seconds, so the airlines use
consolidators. We are "out-of-the-way" in that we
are not allowed to advertise the names of the airlines.
Just as savy shoppers know about and take the time
to shop the outlet stores, so do savvy travelers
know about air consolidators and use them to save
money.
There are pros and cons to buying
consolidator tickets and the pros far outweigh the
cons. You are flying on a major airline at a dramitically
reduced price; you can buy your ticket for next
day travel to almost a year ahead; your ability
to buy tickets within the 21, 14 and 7 day advance
purchase rules for the same price only increases
the amount of money you save; you may earn frequent
flyer mileage on most of our airlines; in many cases
these fares are available for both individual and
group travel; you can fly into one city and leave
from another -and discounted business class fares
are available on some airlines. The negatives are
that the airlines don't want to make changes or
refunds to these tickets once they have been issued.
If changes or refunds are allowed heavy penalties
are charged.
We also offer great deals on car rentals,
hotels, tours and cruises. For domestic air travel
we can offer you great savings with our partnership
with Hotwire.com. Just press on our link to get
domestic fares which you can actually book on-line.
Our goal is to provide you with top class service
at great price savings. If you are unsure of anything
or just have questions please e-mail us. We try
to answer all mail within two hours during our normal
work hours. In Arizona, this is from 8:30 AM to
5:30 PM, Monday through Friday. We are on Mountain
Standard Time with the exception that Arizona does
not "spring ahead" with Daylight Savings Time.
International
Airfares
