Mark Pestronk
Q: I recently left my longtime host agency and joined a new host. I have bookings, including high-end cruises, extending out another two years. My old host is refusing to transfer any of these pending bookings. How do I force the old house to cooperate in the transfer?
A: Unless your agreement with the old host agency requires the host to cooperate, there is no way that you can force the host to do anything. The bookings belong to the host and can stay with the host.
For some bookings, you can get the client to cancel and rebook through the new host. In the majority of cases, this somewhat underhanded procedure will not work, either because the client will incur penalties for canceling or the supplier has no availability for new bookings.
For some of your other bookings, especially with small suppliers that don't care about their relationships with the old host, you can probably induce the supplier to transfer the booking to the new host. However, for probably the vast majority of your bookings, including those with cruise lines, major tour operators and resorts, you can't induce the supplier to move the booking without the old host's and the supplier's consent.
If the old host is unwilling to consent, you could be facing an operational nightmare. The old host does not have to let you access its systems, so you could be unable even to contact the client if you didn't retain contact information. Even if you did retain it, you could be unable to work on the booking.
In the worst case, if the client is left high and dry, you could be facing claims for breach of contract or negligence if the booking is not finalized and the supplier cancels it. Lacking any way to force cooperation, you need to try to induce the old host to act.
I recommend a four-party agreement among you, the old host, the new host and the supplier. The supplier would agree to pay the new host, and you or the new host would agree to remit to the old host a portion of what would have been its share of each commission payment when it is collected.
To mitigate the old host's risk that the new host might fail to honor the agreement, the agreement could provide that the old host would retain any amounts already due to you as collateral to ensure payment for the transferred bookings.
Of course, there is no guaranty that the old host or the supplier will agree to such an arrangement rather than try to keep all your bookings in-house and retain 100% of the commission. Further, negotiating and structuring all these four-party agreements requires a huge amount of work for you and the new host.
Therefore, the ideal arrangement would have been to provide, in your agreement with the old host, that the host will cooperate in post-termination transfers in return for your promise to remit its share of the commission when you receive it.