ACTA's 2018 Membership Survey Results
Thank you to the over 500+ ACTA members across the country who provided such valuable input to the 2018 Membership Survey, and Consultations conducted throughout the summer. Respondents represented a good cross section of owners/managers and frontline members in both Corporate and Leisure sectors. Your feedback helps us shape our priorities to best represent the issues you have identified as most relevant to you.
- Overall satisfaction with the work ACTA does on behalf of members is strong, and when asked 97% indicated they are likely to renew membership. A strong percentage of our Members would also recommend ACTA to their travel colleagues.
- Member feedback on ACTA’s four strategic pillars (Advocate, Promote, Educate and Connect) are in sync with what you identify as most important to you. Both importance and ACTA Performance on measures within the four pillars each achieved high ratings.
- While the high rankings validate our priorities, we learned that the membership now places as much value (9.1 out on 10) on promoting the value of engaging a travel professional with the public. This now matches the high ranking you give to our advocating to different levels of government and regulatory bodies to address industry concerns and priorities. This is a valuable insight for us that will be reflected in our on-going activities.
- In the Educate pillar, working with the travel industry to develop professional education programs and professional standards was the highest ranked priority (8.2 out of 10), although all education priorities ranked highly.
- Supporting members on issues relating to credit compliance, travel fraud, travel health insurance and other business matters rated highest in the Connect pillar, followed closely by communicating to members trends, innovations and policy changes to ensure Members are up to date on the latest industry developments.
Direction from Members on Advocacy Activities to Pursue
As ACTA develops our 2019 advocacy activities, your response confirmed our direction on what is important among the membership to continue and where you would like ACTA to place more or enhanced focus:
- Increase our efforts with Travel Suppliers to encourage more emphasis on booking through a travel professional and to ensure equitable relationships between them and the Canadian travel agency community
- Improve the profitability of travel agencies by working to lower or at least stabilize costs such as credit fees, supplier surcharges and taxes incurred when arranging travel on behalf of clients
- Continue to work with provincial travel regulators (Ontario, Quebec and BC) to ensure the rules governing the travel industry are fair for Canadian travel agencies
- Continue to work with travel professionals, suppliers and government to continuously identify ways to combat fraud in the industry
Your ACTA team values the feedback provided in the 2018 Membership Survey and Consultations and is already taking steps in all our Pillars to both act on your behalf and effectively communicate to you on the issues you’ve identified as most relevant to you.