Huma is a freelance food journalist who reviews restaurant openings all over the world. She often has to travel at a moment's notice- that's why she needs a travel agency that operates 24/7, responds to her quickly, and communicates via multiple means. More important, she needs an agency that can find her direct, non-stop flights and accommodations close to the restaurants she'll review. Huma isn't partial to any particular airline carrier or hotel chain-she doesn't have any frequent flier points-so this is not a priority for her. Even less important to her is cost. Publications for which she writes rarely question her expenses and are happy to compensate her 100%. One colleague recommended that she work with Travel Smart, the most cost-effective agency in the business that also provides really high levels of customer service. Her experience with Travel Smart has been positive overall. Its agents respond to her quickly-via phone, email, and text. However, they do not find her the most convenient flights; most have been indirect requiring at least two stopovers. To compensate, though, they have been able to upgrade her to business class on a number of these flights. While Travel Smart certainly offers above-average customer service, it does not necessarily offer the most creative solutions to her travel needs. Furthermore, one of the reasons why Travel Smart is so affordable is because of its industry partnerships: It can get discounted airfare because it promises those carriers customers like Huma. Direct Your Way is another travel agency that Huma has worked with in the past. One of Huma's biggest frustrations with Direct Your Way is the inconsistent response of its agents. They do not respond as predictably or as frequently as Travel Smart's agents do and their communications are generally restricted to email. When they do respond, however, they do so with itineraries and solutions that are tailored to Huma's exact travel needs. This level of creative service comes with a cost, though. Direct Your Way is pricey-not the most expensive agency around but definitely more expensive than most. Direct Your Way also maintains fewer industry partnerships- as such, its fares and accommodation costs are usually on the high end. Huma does not find this surprising, though, given that the flights the agents locate are generally direct and non-stop, and the hotels are almost always within walking distance of the restaurants Huma is assigned to review. The expenses actually align with her expectations. Huma identifies four key criteria to help her determine which travel agency to stick with: the availability of the agency, the alliances the agency has with travel and accommodation providers, the cost management options-that is, the ability to offer competitive rates, and the quality of service-the ability to locate convenient flights and accommodations. The following product evaluation table shows the numerical importance weights and performance scores that Huma applied to each of the selection criteria she identified. Note that the total weight of all four criteria equals 1.0, where 0.1 is the least important and 0.4 is the most important. The performance scores fall on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is the lowest score and 10 is the highest. The total performance scores vary across each vendor. Availability Alliances Cost Importance Performance Weights Score Management Quality of Service TOTAL 0.4 0.2 0.1 Travel Smart 0.3 10 10 7 Performance Weighted Score 3 33 4 2 0.7 .9 7.6 Direct Your Way Weighted 2. How important are industry alliances to Huma? (Click to select) 1. How important is availability of travel agency agents to Huma? (Click to select) 3. How important is total cost, including any fees, to Huma? (Click to select) 4. How important is overall service quality to Huma? (Click to select) 3 3 3 10 19 5. According to Huma, how does Travel Smart perform on alliances? (Click to select) 8. Which travel agency was rated lowest on availability? (Click to select) 7. Which travel agency was rated higher on cost management? (Click to select) 1.2 0.6 0.3 6. According to Huma, how does Direct Your Way perform on alliances? (Click to select) 3 5.1