TOUR OPERATIONS SPECIALIST
smarTours® was founded in 1996 with one goal in mind: to make it possible for our customers to experience once-in-a-lifetime trips again and again. We operate group tours to international destinations at prices that make amazing trips accessible to a wide audience. While smarTours has been operating for 25 years, we are currently rebuilding the company with a customer experience and technology focus from the ground up. We are looking for a person with strong organizational skills and a passion for travel and customer experience to join our Tour Operations team.
The Tour Operations Specialist will report into our Tour Operations Manager and be responsible for ensuring an incredible tour experience for our customers. Tour operations require dependable, empathetic, and resilient problem solvers who can relate well to others, work positively in a team, and forge ahead independently when needed. Strict time management, attention to detail, organization, and relationship building skills are essential qualities for this role. The person in this role will be the subject matter expert for their assigned destinations and will work closely with internal teams and external suppliers to ensure our operations are seamless and that we exceed customer expectations.
Responsibilities:
Learn and embrace customer expectations and service details for each departure to ensure we are delivering a high quality and on-budget experience every time.
Effectively communicate departure details to our suppliers and tour directors to help ensure their success in delivering an excellent experience on the ground.
Tightly manage several concurrent deadlines across multiple trips and departures.
Identify and communicate customer rooming requirements, special inquiries, individual/group transfers, mobility, dietary and health needs.
Build and maintain positive, loyal supplier relationships, including contract management, sales updates, credit management, payment deadlines, and cancellations.
Update trip and departure components into the booking system as needed, with keen attention to detail for costs and pricing.
Monitor ongoing trips to achieve service excellence and take corrective action where appropriate to improve our tour experience and the efficiency of our team.
Create new or update existing detailed tour documents for our customers, making sure they are accurate and reflect any recent itinerary changes and entry requirements.
As needed, form part of our departmental on-call rotation to assist with travel related emergencies; must be available for after-hours and weekend call duties periodically.
Requirements:
2+ years of travel related operating experience preferred.
Highly organized and able to balance competing and time-sensitive priorities with a sense of urgency and extreme attention to detail.
Positive presence with the ability to communicate with a wide variety of internal and external stakeholders.
Analytical and creative problem solver who can calmly work through emergency and escalated situations.
Tech-savvy; ability to learn in-house booking engine and operational tools.
Ability to partake in the on-call rotation schedule.
smarTours is an equal opportunity employer and offers:
A competitive salary based on experience
Health insurance (cost subsidized by the company)
4 weeks PTO, plus 5 sick days and 11 holidays off annually
Travel benefits and travel opportunities for team building
This position is fully remote
Note: At this point in time, all candidates for this role must be authorized to work in the U.S. without need of visa sponsorship.