Direct Research On The Performance Assessment Methods Used In Romanian Travel Agencies In Order To Evaluate The Travel Agents’ Performance

The purpose of this research was to point out the methods used nowadays to evaluate the Romanian travel agents’ performance. Such a research has never been conducted in the branch of Romanian travel agencies and this study represents a starting point for the specialist who are interested of the performance evaluation process in travel agencies. The representative sample was calculated and a quantitative research was conducted in order to find out the most important aspects which characterized the evaluation process of Romanian travel agent’s performance. 170 respondents participated at this study. The instrument for collecting the data was a questionnaire, which was first tested on a pilot sample composed of ten travel agency managers. The results of the research showed that the most important criteria taken into account when it comes to evaluate the performance of travel agents are: the sales volume achieved by the employees, the number of customers who purchase the travel packages, the average time for solving the customers’ demands, the number of customers who return to buy a new travel package from the same employee, the number of complaints received, the image and behavior of the employees. The direct manager and the general manager are mainly, the ones responsible of the performance assessment process. In travel agencies, the assessment of the employees’ performances happens once or twice per year. The managers are interested both on individual and team performance. As future directions it is recommended to repeat the research after one or five years to see how the performance assessment process has changed through time.