• What dates do you wish to travel? While Barclay International Group needs exact dates in order to place a reservation, it’s always good to get alternative (second-choice) dates, if your clients are at all flexible.
• What are your primary goals when traveling? Theatre-going? Sightseeing? Shopping? By knowing the purpose of their trip, Barclay International Group will be better able to place your clients in the most convenient location.
• What are your special needs?
• How many persons will be traveling?
• What kind of bedding is needed (doubles, twins, sofabeds, cots)?
• With larger parties, can two persons sleep in the living room on sofabeds or cots to save money?
• Can everyone in your party climb stairs, or is an elevator a necessity? In fact, is anyone in the traveling party physically-challenged and thus be unable to enjoy an apartment stay? (Many properties cannot accommodate wheelchairs.)
• Do you plan to cook extensively or just use the kitchen to butter a roll at breakfast-time?
• Are you a more independent group of travelers or would you feel more comfortable with a concierge downstairs? Do you prefer an apartment with a balcony, garden, dishwasher, washer-dryer or a microwave?
• How often do you require maid service? By allowing Barclay International Group to accurately assess all of your clients’ needs, we can place them more effectively.
• Where have you stayed in the past? Often, we find that travelers are hesitant to reveal their travel budget, but since apartments range from modest to deluxe, it’s important to establish what they want to pay. Please find out which hotels they’ve stayed at before and how those hotels have met their expectations. This will allow us to place them in the same ‘class’ of apartment they enjoyed as a hotel guest.
• What additional services will you require? Have your clients think their trip through in advance: how will they be getting from the airport to their apartment? How do they plan to travel around town? What sights are they interested in seeing? What are they planning to do in the evenings? Then give this information to Barclay International Group and we’ll put together a package that fills all of their travel needs.
  (Note: All services are either sold on a commissionable basis or on a net basis to which you can add your commission).

Also remember—apartments are different than hotels in that apartments must be prepaid in full—a small price to pay for such great cost savings!

Deposit and Final Payment Requirements:

(Note: The following requirements apply to apartment bookings. Cottage and villa bookings vary in their deposit and cancellation requirements and will be advised at the time of booking.

Please make sure that your clients are certain about their travel dates and choice of apartment BEFORE making a booking. This is especially important because if the dates and apartment type requested is available, and you are making the reservation more than five weeks prior to the clients’ intended arrival, we will automatically hold the reservation with a non-refundable deposit, the amount of which varies per property anywhere from $200 to 50% of the total rental cost. The restrictions button on each individual property will alert you to the deposit required for that specific property. Alternately, we can accept an agency check for the deposit as long as it is received within seven days of the booking being confirmed. We will still need to have the clients’ credit card number in order to make the initial reservation, but will not charge the deposit to the card if the agent advises us IN ADVANCE that the booking will be paid by agency check. Should the client cancel before the check is received, we will automatically charge the clients’ credit card for the non-refundable deposit.

Credit Card Authorization Form:
Prior to charging a client's credit card, we will forward a credit card authorization form which must be completed by the CLIENT, and faxed back to us together with front and back copy of the card being charged. Under no circumstances should this be signed on the client's behalf. the above procedures ensure security for the agent and the client.

Final Payment:
The remaining cost of the rental (full prepayment less deposit) is automatically charged to clients’ credit cards five to ten weeks before arrival depending on the property involved. Reservations made within this period are charged the full prepayment at the time of booking, rather than the deposit. Deposits and prepayments by agency check must be received by the date indicated or accommodations will be automatically released. In addition to these payments, please advise clients that it is normal procedure to leave an imprint of their credit card as deposit against breakage, telephone charges and miscellaneous incidentals. Some properties will charge a set amount and hold it until phone charges can be assessed. Clients booking Barclay International Group Exclusive properties will be charged this amount automatically at the time they make their booking; unused funds will be returned a few weeks following their clients’ stay.

Commission:
Travel agents’ commissions are paid at the end of the month following their clients’ departure from the apartment, villa or cottage booked. For example, if you client stays at an apartment from April 29-May 6th, your commission will be mailed out around the 31st of May. Travel agents who wish to deduct their commissions upfront must prepay entire reservations by check five to ten weeks prior to arrival (depending on the property) and deduct the commission from that final payment. Commission is 8% on accommodations, except for those agents for whom we are preferred suppliers. Those agents receive commissions that have been negotiated directly with us, but only on those bookings which are paid by check and not credit card. Supplemental service charges are commissionable in some cases (rail passes, car rentals) but others (theatre tickets, airport transfers, etc.) are sold on a net basis. Some services (travel insurance, for example) are non-commissionable to you if purchased through BIG; we suggest you sell those services directly to your clients rather than using our forms.

Contacting Barclay International Group After Departure:
Barclay International Group agents are available from 9:00am-5:30pm Eastern Standard Time to assist with any complaints pertaining to accommodations/services we have booked. Our U.S. office can be reached toll-free from the USA and Canada. For travelers staying in other countries, we can supply you and your clients with the name of a local contact (be it a concierge, building owner or management firm) who can handle on-site complaints.

Dissatisfaction with Accommodations:
It is extremely important for clients to give you all your travel requirements and for those requirements to be conveyed to Barclay International Group BEFORE making actual reservations—to ensure that they receive exactly what you want. For example, if you tell us during the booking process that location doesn’t matter, your clients can’t call up from London, asking to cancel their apartment because it isn’t close enough to the theatre district. Likewise, we cannot accept cancellations based on personal taste, such as your clients’ dislike for the apartment’s wallpaper color. And clients who book a three-star apartment cannot realistically expect five-star apartment services. Be sure to ask all questions regarding amenities BEFORE booking your reservation; all apartment inclusions are listed in BarclayWeb under the property description.

However, if your clients arrive at their accommodations and find that the apartment is not as it was represented (for example, it is a Studio and not the One-Bedroom you reserved, or it lacks electricity, heat or any other promised service), they can call the local contact (concierge, management staff, our local office if they are in London) who will do all possible to get them moved to another apartment in the building, or have the problem remedied immediately. If this does not yield satisfactory results, they can call Barclay International Group’s local office (if they are in London) or call us in New York. In outstanding circumstances, if we cannot fix the problem to the clients' satisfaction in the accommodation booked, we will move them to another apartment in our inventory.

Please remember that we cannot do anything unless we are alerted to a problem. Clients who complete a stay at an apartment that lacked necessary services without notifying management cannot expect a refund after the fact—especially since we most likely could have fixed the problem early in their stay.

Cancellations/No Shows:
If your clients need to cancel, please contact our office directly and we will cancel the reservation on their behalf. Be sure to note the date/time of cancellation, the name of the person you spoke with, and any cancellation numbers. Cancellations made more than five to nine weeks prior to scheduled arrival (depending on the property) are subject to loss of the nonrefundable deposit unless they were insured and are being cancelled for covered reasons. Any cancellations made within five to nine weeks of arrival (after final payment has been made) are non-refundable except where specifically noted. For this reason, we strongly urge that all travelers take out trip cancellation insurance to protect their investment. Information on trip cancellation can be found on our Supplemental Services page; no doubt your agency has trip cancellation forms that should automatically be mailed to clients when Barclay International Group accommodations are reserved.

Arrival/Departure Times:
Unless provisions have been made for pre-registration at additional expense, normal check-in hours are usually after 2:00 P.M; the exact time is noted on the property description. In most cases, the property will allow clients to leave their luggage until accommodation is available. Check-out time is normally 10:00 A.M. unless otherwise indicated on the property description sheet or unless alternate arrangements have been made with the property.

Caveat:
Please note that apartments,villas and cottages operate differently from each other. For that reason, all deposit, final payment and refund information must be discussed directly with a Barclay International Group reservationist.