Retail Travel Consultant

Your team: News UK will soon launch a digital travel retail operation for The Times and The Sunday Times. Consumers will be able to plan and book holidays, both on and offline, across a wide variety of product types. Your role: In order for this to succeed we require dynamic and enthusiastic Travel Sales Consultants who havea passion for travel with a proven background of luxury travel and tailor made holidays, and the ability tobuild client relationships, converting enquiries into bookings, and ensuring the smooth operation of the pre-travel concierge process . Day to day you will:

• Build and maintain strong relationships with clients, responding to enquiries via telephone, email, whatsapp and live chat.
• Create bespoke holiday proposals tailored to client requirements across cruise, touring and luxury tailor-made.
• Ownership of the administrative elements of all bookings; confirmations, invoicing.
• Ability and experience in directly liaising with hotels, airlines, cruise lines and tour operators to ensure accuracy and seamless travel arrangements.
• Proactively generate enquiries from our existing client base.
• Achieve and exceed sales performance targets.
• Own and manage the entire process from itinerary creation to booking, invoicing, and managing any pre and post sales enquiries accommodating any special requests.
• Curate new and exciting holiday itineraries, aligned to editorial content, to engage customers and encourage sales.
• Load itineraries into the CMS for both marketing opportunities and customer quotes.
• Assist with ad hoc projects and activities to support marketing and business growth.
  
  Experience in a retail travel sales environment
• An articulate and confident telephone manner.
• Strong written communication skills; excellent grammar.
• Experience in sales and working within a target-driven environment.
• Exceptional organisational skills and attention to detail.
• A friendly, enthusiastic attitude and willingness to tackle any task.
• Proven experience working towards and achieving sales targets and KPIs.
• A passion for delivering outstanding customer service.
• Ability to quickly learn and adapt to new computer systems.
• A genuine passion for travel, exploring new destinations and learning about new experiences, cultures and travel products
• In-depth knowledge of luxury travel products particularly cruise, touring and tailor made holidays
• First-hand travel experience in areas like Australia, New Zealand, the USA, Canada, or Asia is desirable.
• Ability to exceed customer expectations at every opportunity.
• Creativity and imagination for putting together immersive and imaginative itineraries
• Strong work ethic
  
  If you think you have what it takes but don't tick every requirement on the list, please do apply. We recognise that considering someone's potential as well as their experience is a great way to hire. We want to hear from people who have a passion to learn and develop.
We are News UK : One of the leading media businesses in the UK and Ireland. Our newsbrands include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun, The Sun on Sunday and The TLS. Our national broadcast brands include talkSPORT, Times Radio, Talk and Virgin Radio UK, and we have market-leading local radio stations across Ireland. Our world-famous brands provide news, analysis, opinion and entertainment to almost 40 million people each month. Spanning print and pixel, audio and video, events and experiences, our multiplatform brands are home to a plurality of opinion, representing the diverse communities we serve. News UK is wholly owned by News Corp. Life at News Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose. We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter. We inform our audiences so that they can make decisions based on trusted information. To do this, we believe our employees must represent different backgrounds, perspectives and experiences. We strive to maximise and encourage every individual's potential and ensure everyone feels valued. We support this through ourDiversity, Equity and Inclusion Strategy (https://www.news.co.uk/more-than-the-news/diversity-inclusion/) , which focuses on three main priorities - attracting talent from a wider, more representative pool, developing equity programmes to drive better representation in our leadership, and ensuring diversity and inclusivity in our workforce as well as the journalism and content we produce. We also currently have12 employee led networks and groups (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMCi-KiMlL4&t=2s) that support our strategy and connect like minded employees socially.


• Monday - Thursday: 9am to 6pm
• Friday: 9am to 5pm
• Initially 25 days holiday (+ bank holidays)
• Flexibility to work weekends and out-of-hours., Some of our benefits include:
• Maternityleave up to 18 weeks full basic salary &paternityleave up to 2 weeks
• Wide range oftrainingavailable, plus full LinkedIn Learning access
• Private medical insuranceincluding coverage for pre-existing conditions
• Discounted gym memberships, free ClassPass at Home, weekly virtual yoga classes
• 'Bikes for Work'and 'Electric Car' scheme
• Up to 60% discount on Harper Collins books
• Access to exclusive events and competitions with exciting brands such as talkSPORT, Virgin Radio UK & The Times. Weekly virtual panel chats with top journalists and celebrities
• Access towellbeing benefitssuch as EAP, physio/massage and counselling
• A generouspensionscheme with employer contributions of up to 5%