You may not be able to finagle yourself a free ticket to London, Rio or across the US, but you can get almost free tickets if you are a little flexible and willing to do a little work. You can travel as an air courier and transport merchandise to other countries or states while the company that needs the items moved pays for most of your airline ticket. Not even an Internet travel dealer or consolidator can beat these prices.
If you know where you want to go and can leave when the company needs you to, and can travel lightly, air courier travel might be for you. It’s not hard to be an air courier but is a little more involved than paying for a ticket and walking through the gate.
So why travel as an air courier? One word money. You’ll save lots of it by traveling as the agent of a company that hires you. It’s not uncommon for air couriers to fly, round trip to London, for $100. Or Rio for $150. Or Mexico for free. You will have to pay for your stay once you reach your destination and your trip may not last for weeks but you’ll save many hundreds of dollars off getting to and from your vacation spot.
A courier is essentially a delivery person. You check your baggage allowance, your bags filled with cargo of some sort that the delivery company needs you to escort to the destination. You don’t get additional compensation beyond the discounted or free airline ticket.
Once you reach your destination, you will often be met at the airport by the person or company that is to take possession of your cargo. You may have paperwork instructions from the hiring company to ensure you actually completed your end of the deal and transferred the goods to the right person.
Are pictures of dark figures in back alleys and accusations of working for the mafia or a drug ring running through your mind? Don’t worry most couriers transport small parcels or paperwork. Being a courier is completely legal and you can always say “no” if you don’t trust that the parcel(s) are on the up-and-up.
To be an air courier, you must be 18 or older and hold a US or European Union passport that is valid for the next six months or more. Many courier companies require a criminal record free of any felony convictions and a clean drug test, others are more lax. Either way, you should adhere to a business-casual dress code during all activities when you are representing the company and escorting their cargo.
The types of companies that use air couriers are varied. Some are looking for one-time freelancers, others are seeking a regular courier to travel between set cities. To find a company looking for a courier job that you’d be interested in, you should begin looking for air courier booking agencies. These “middle men” introduce companies with a need to freelancers looking for a nearly free ticket. Once you’ve provided safe passage of goods for a company, they may request you again through the booking agent or simply contact you for future jobs. There may be a small fee when working with a booking agent but you should never pay until the contract has been signed. The fee and the supplemental airfare should still be far less than any airline ticket you could purchase.
Flexibility is very important when considering the time you’ll have to spend at your destination. Some return tickets will find you above the Earth heading back home after just a day or two, others might permit for a week’s vacation and still others will be open ended, allowing you to choose when you are ready to return. Once the return reservation has been booked, though, you are responsible for catching your flight. If you miss the plane home, you must find your own means of transportation home, whether that means paying full fare for a ticket or renting a car or what have you.
Once you have found a courier company you’d like to consider working for, you will need to tell them which dates and destinations you are available to travel. The more flexible you are here, the more likely you are to be offered the chance to fly nearly free. Should your schedule clear up unexpectedly, you can always call the booking agent and ask for a job over the weekend or week.
The booking agent will either offer you a job when you call in or phone you when one becomes available. At that time, you can inquire about return dates and ticket price. You can then accept or decline the job.
Upon acceptance of the job, you are under a legally binding verbal contract. Many booking agents will require you to sign and fax a written contract soon thereafter, others will ask you to sign one at the airport when you meet.
Check in with the booking or delivery company a few days before your departure. Make sure you know who you’ll meet, when and where you’ll meet and specific instructions about delivery at your destination.
Prior to checking in, meet with the representative and pick up the parcels or documents, as well as your ticket. Check your luggage and keep all paperwork. Should the cargo become lost in transit you may have to prove you did everything you were supposed to do to secure its safe delivery.
Upon arrival at your destination, find the receiving agent at the pre-appointed meeting area. Once you turn over the goods or documents, it’s time to start enjoying your vacation. The rest of the time, until your scheduled departure, is all yours.
Jawahn Thompson
http://www.articlesbase.com/travel-articles/nearly-free-flying-company-travel-75806.html
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What do you think about our taxpayer money spent on ….?
WALL STREET JOURNAL…………
Order a reprint of this article now JULY 2, 2009.Congress’s Travel Tab Swells
Spending on Taxpayer-Funded Trips Rises Tenfold; From Italy to the Galápagos.ArticleComments (171)more in Politics ».
By BRODY MULLINS and T.W. FARNAM
WASHINGTON — Spending by lawmakers on taxpayer-financed trips abroad has risen sharply in recent years, a Wall Street Journal analysis of travel records shows, involving everything from war-zone visits to trips to exotic spots such as the Galápagos Islands.
The spending on overseas travel is up almost tenfold since 1995, and has nearly tripled since 2001, according to the Journal analysis of 60,000 travel records. Hundreds of lawmakers traveled overseas in 2008 at a cost of about $13 million. That’s a 50% jump since Democrats took control of Congress two years ago.
The cost of so-called congressional delegations, known among lawmakers as "codels," has risen nearly 70% since 2005, when an influence-peddling scandal led to a ban on travel funded by lobbyists, according to the data.
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Gov. Bob Riley via Flickr Alabama Gov. Bob Riley (left) and Sen. Richard Shelby in June on a river cruise in Paris, where U.S. politicians met with defense-industry executives.
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Lawmakers say that the trips are a good use of government funds because they allow members of Congress and their staff members to learn more about the world, inspect U.S. assets abroad and forge better working relationships with each other. The travel, for example, includes official visits to American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Journal analysis, based on information published in the Congressional Record, also shows that taxpayer-funded travel is a big and growing perk for lawmakers and their families. Some members of Congress have complained in recent months about chief executives of bailed-out banks, insurance companies and car makers who sponsored corporate trips to resorts or used corporate jets for their own travel.
Although complete travel records aren’t yet available for 2009, it appears that such costs continue to rise. The Journal analysis shows that the government has picked up the tab for travel to destinations such as Jamaica, the Virgin Islands and Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.
Lawmakers frequently bring along spouses on congressional trips. If they take commercial flights, they have to buy tickets for spouses. If they fly on government planes — as they usually do — their spouses can fly free.
Paris Air Show
In mid-June, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D., Hawaii) led a group of a half-dozen senators and their spouses on a four-day trip to France for the biennial Paris Air Show. An itinerary for the event shows that lawmakers flew on the Air Force’s version of the Boeing 737, which costs $5,700 an hour to operate. They stayed at the Intercontinental Paris Le Grand Hotel, which advertises rooms from $460 a night.
The lawmakers were invited to a dinner party at the U.S. Embassy and had cocktails at a private party at the Eiffel Tower. Mr. Inouye attended a dinner sponsored by the Aerospace Industries Association, a U.S. trade group. Another senator on the trip, Alabama Republican Sen. Richard Shelby, took a cruise on the River Seine with defense-industry executives and elected officials from Alabama, Mississippi and Florida.
Mr. Inouye and Mr. Shelby declined to comment.
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Often, lawmakers combine trips to war zones with visits to more tranquil spots. In February, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi led a delegation of Democratic lawmakers to visit U.S. troops in Afghanistan for a day. Before landing in Kabul, the eight lawmakers and their entourage of spouses and aides spent eight days in Italy, spending $57,697 on hotels and meals.
A spokesman for Ms. Pelosi says that she was working in Italy, meeting with U.S. troops at Aviano Air Base, laying a wreath at the Florence American Cemetery, giving a speech to Italian lawmakers and visiting the Pope, among other things.
Homeland Security
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D., Miss.), the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, led a group to Brazil, Argentina, Peru and Panama. "This trip further solidified the message that homeland security does not begin or end at our borders," says Mr. Thompson’s spokeswoman.
Journal Communitydiscuss..“ The very people who try to scold executives for flying on private jets turn around and hop on their private jet – paid for by you, the taxpayer. ”
.— Daniel Baker.
Many congressional trips have been to Iraq or Afghanistan. In 2008, lawmakers and aides took 113 trips to Iraq, according to the Journal analysis, down slightly from the prior year. Not much money is spent in the war zones. Lawmakers are not allowed to stay overnight in Iraq and receive only minimal spending allowances for their one-day visits.
In mid-February, for example, six House lawmakers traveled to Kuwait, Iraq, Bahrain and Afghanistan. Each lawmaker reported spending $1,500
It is a practice that should be stopped, and the ones who do it arrested and thrown in jail.
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The majority of taxpayer dollars is spent killing people in the Middle East. And I object!
I read an article some years ago where the author wrote, "Americans would rather kill Iraqis than build quality schools for their own children."
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I get it. That’s why we all need to sacrifice – so they won’t have to.
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