On Feb 5, 1:27 pm, mgb wrote:
This is not a slight on TA's. They do valuable work but I ask a
legitimate question to the group - why should experienced cruisers,
people like me, bother?

Really no reason to use a TA, far as I can tell. I used a bricks &
mortar TA for my first two cruises, but then realized I was doing all
of the legwork, and was more on top of my booking than they were. And,
I was able to get significantly better pricing elsewhere. I guess, in
the beginning, it's nice to have a face-to-face to walk you through
the process, but once you know what's going on, their (the TA's) role
becomes less and less important. I've booked with the various travel
portals (like Yahoo travel) where you do actually have the option to
talk to someone, and I've booked with one online TA that offered
absolutely no phone contact, but was very responsive via email. Both
worked out just fine. My last few cruises have been with a TA from
buycruises.com who works out of her home - but there's always someone
available to take a call, if your specific TA is not. So, in all these
instances, you're still technically working with a TA to make the
booking, it's just not somebody that you're actually seeing in person.

For two specialty cruises I've taken, I worked with TAs that
specialized in the actual cruiselines I was using - one TA for my
Windjammer Barefoot Cruise and one for my Glacier Bay Cruiseline
cruise (unfortunately, they're now defunct). Since these were cruises
that were different than the everyday, run-of-the-mill mass market
cruises, it was infinitely helpful to work with folks that had
extensive knowledge specifically about these particular products. But,
again, most all contact was made via email, there were a few phone
calls, but we never had an in-person meeting.

I say go for it - book it yourself.

Lee