Show me the Money
by John Hawks

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During the recent Original Home Based Travel Agent Show & Conference in San Diego, I picked up the latest edition of Anita Pagliasso's book for home-based agents. I have an older edition of Anita's book on my office shelves at home, but to be honest I hadn't seen the newest version. Page by page, it's filled with practical information -- not a lot of fluff, but hands-on advice for growing your travel business. With Anita's permission, I'd like to share the following recommendations from her book for back-office tasks that I will be putting to good use within the next month:

The four-drawer filing system

I must confess that I'm prone to filing paperwork using a "pile" system. Yes, I know what's in each pile, roughly, but it can take me a few minutes to find a specific document! Anita recommends using four file drawers:

• Drawer # 1 holds your active clients that you're currently working on -- trip requests, cruises that haven't been paid in full, etc.
• Drawer # 2 holds your booked client files, with trips paid in full. Anita says she doesn't move these files into the next drawer until her clients have returned from their trip and she calls them to see how things went. (Very smart idea.)
• Drawer # 3 holds completed trip files until the suppliers have paid all commissions. How much money do home-based agents lose every year because we don't track those unpaid commissions closely?
• Drawer # 4 holds the files after that last step -- a fertile ground for follow-up calls later in the year!

With business receipts, Anita uses an accordion-type file folder organized by month and category (with one slot set aside for those questionable expenses you need to discuss with your accountant at tax time!). That way, she can sort receipts as she gets them without letting them pile up on the corner of a desk.

This isn't a sales pitch for Anita, but I read a lot of travel and management books all year round, and what's interesting about her stuff is that it's very practical and ready for immediate use. Check out her information at her site.

(Stock photos)