Agents to use caching to improve web sales

Agents with an online offering will increasingly use caching to improve website performance, according to a major bed bank supplier.

Caching, when agents store booking information, such as prices and availability, on a local server, avoids having to continually access live information.

Holiday Brokers sales director Brian Young told delegates there would be greater pressure to improve search speeds. “Agents can store data locally; it cuts live search time by 90% and massively increases response time.”

The downside of caching, however, is that price and availability is not always accurate, providing a headache for online retailers. “It’s hard for agents because they are producing one price and then having to get a live price. One in 20 find the price has changed when they book.”

Young said the bed bank’s most searched-for destination was Majorca and claimed to return searches in less than eight seconds.

Holiday Brokers is part of the On Holiday Group.

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