Choosing a good school tour provider

Organising any school trip away from the ‘safe zone’ of the controlled school environment is a challenge. A great way of off-setting both a lot of workload and filling the experience gap is to work with a skilled and experienced tour company. However, like any competitive field of work, there are those companies who are good at tours and should be trusted and those who aren’t so good. So how do you know who to entrust with your tour? It isn’t easy but here are some pointers that will help you to spot the good and the bad tour providers.

It will be tempting to gather multiple quotes and then choose the best offer. However, beware of this approach. Whilst price must be a decision factor in any tour, it should never be the foremost. Quality has a certain price and nine times out of ten a more expensive but quality programme will save in peace of mind, in parental complaints and potentially in the long run in preventing add-on costs. Not to mention it will be more likely to fulfil the set educational purpose of the trip. If a company over-states being the cheapest, my tip would be steer clear as at best their focus is more on sales than production and at worst they are dangerously cutting too many corners. Saying this you can find bargains but make sure to check the bargain has never come at the expense of a core programme feature.

Whilst admittedly when going through the tiring process of organising a trip it can be a relief to have a trip provider always telling you ‘yes’ to your every request, this actually could be indicating something to worry about. ‘Yes’ answers without additional ‘but if’ information may mean you are organising a trip company very willing to promise things but perhaps not so likely to deliver. A good quality trip provider won’t just tell you straight forward ‘yes’ (or ‘no’), rather they tell you honestly about the impacts of requesting additional things, be that on the programme or in adding cost. In short you shouldn’t look for the company that promises perfection, you should rather look for the one who impresses you that they know best how to protect the quality of their core tour features.

What if’ questions are a great way of spotting the difference between a tour provider who knows how to sell a school tour and one who actually knows how to organise and deliver one. You should be giving importance to seeking to find the latter. ‘What if a child falls sick? What if an emergency happens in the accommodation in the middle of the night?’ How well the tour provider answers these kinds of questions will tell you a lot about their actual experience and even more so about the ethos of the company. You should be seeking a tour provider who has experience dealing with the unexpected and in planning how to prevent problems. These are core features of a quality tour provider.

Whilst we teachers are no different to anyone else and will appreciate personal perks, you should nonetheless be wary of choosing a company who sells you a tour overstressing what ‘extra things’ teachers get. Teacher perks might be nice to receive but it shows where a company places its focus and at the end of the day a poorly organised tour with great teacher perks will almost certainly cause you more stress and strain. A company who puts kids first will be on top of their safety, they will have plans Bs in case of bad weather and will usually be run by a group of educationally-focused staff who know the core aspect of teaching is putting the educational and safety needs of the children first.

Whilst it is the nature of the world that all companies and people need to sell/ promote themselves and their products, we should see selling catalogues for what they are which is a way to catch our attention. Where we should start judging a tour provider is on the quality of their programme documentation. Do they provide quality comprehensive risk assessment on request? Does a quote come accompanied by well thought out and minutely timetabled programme? Does the company have class/workshop material? It is this organisational level documentation that tells you a lot about the company and the way it operates and you should be looking to be impressed by that side more than by the initial gloss.

We live in the age of four stars being the minimum for any service we consider. However, we should pay more note to the comments people write rather than the gradings they give. Any quality provider will be able to point you towards an impartial teacher who has done a tour with them before. Ask that teacher the things you need to know and check the tour is a fit for your school. Consider asking them about the staff in the company as this will tell you a lot about the tour company. Also ask the teacher openly if anything went wrong and seek to judge the answer by how well (or not) the tour company dealt with the situation that came up, as in many ways how a tour provider deal with a challenge tells you the most about the ethos and commitment of that tour provider. You can also ask similar questions on teacher forums.

Douglas Haines and Inge Hol are a British/Dutch couple who run Spark Spanish (spanishschooltours.com) a school trip provider based in Spain which offers bespoke residential primary school tours for both independent and state schools.