The Travel Network Group believes increased scale through the acquisition of Global Travel Group will give it greater influence over business partners in future.
Chief executive Gary Lewis said the stronger position in future commercial negotiations would be particularly important in light of how some suppliers had dealt with partners during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Speaking on a Travel Weekly webcast, he said: “Crises create change and create opportunity. We saw that in 2008 and the reality is that business partners and our members, as distribution for those business partners, have a relationship and that relationship is changing.
“There’s different pressures on suppliers – the priority for them is their businesses and you’ve already seen specific business partners raise the issues about financial protection, around pipeline and how money is collected and where responsibilities sit.”
He added: “You’ve had different players come into the market, you’ve got business partners with less resource going forward, because they’re protecting their costs to try and get through the crisis – and yet we’ve still got a crisis that is developing.
“It raises even more fear for us all about what the future holds in the next three, four, five, six months.”
Lewis said joining forces with Global, which adds another 285 agents to its organisation, made it stronger.
“You’re standing together with clarity of communication; with a belief that we can influence the relationship with the business partners and support those business partners.
“You’re holding business partners to account that haven’t performed great through this crisis, often for their own reasons, through no other fault than the crisis; not necessarily theirs.
“But it has brought real strain on certain relationships, while also reinforcing those fantastic business partners who have stepped up and carried on supporting our members.”
He said: “The Global members, the Worldchoice and the TTA members, every single one of them has not shut their phones off, not closed their doors.
“We’ve all been through this pain together and it’s about how we come through that together, but also get the best relationship for our membership going forward.”