Although I am not a fan of travel agencies, I do not doubt that they have some 
benefits, especially when it is your first china travel. Why? A tour to China does not equal to visit those so-called international modern cities, such as Beijing and Shanghai. There is no doubt that you can have friendly and convenient Shanghai Tours by yourself, as local people and tourisms there are extremely “international”. But what if you are planning to visit the inland or western part of China, like Xi’an which used to be the capital for six dynasties, my suggestion would be joining a trip arranged by the travel agencies for the first couple of days.
Pros
1.Tour packages save you money. The 1-day or 3-days city tours in China are
similar to the New York Day Pass or Bus Tour. This kind of tours usually combines tickets of several places with some appealing discounts. Also booking hotels and airplane tickets with the tour packages is economical as well. Since the family trips are concerned with the money, sometimes, the travel agencies have some promotions or good deals for family tours.
2. Relieve you from complicated and time-consuming trip planning. Many visitors are not “professional” backpackers, so the purpose 
of a trip is to relax and leave from the busy daily work. A well-organized and scheduled trip plan costs more than you think. You need to consider how to lower your expense, which hotel is more convenient for you to stay, and what routes you should pick. When you arrive at the tour destination, you still need to think of the trip plans and prepare for anything unexpected. If you are not an experienced trip planner or you are too busy to make trip plans, you can just do some research on choosing travel agencies instead.
Cons and Tips
1.Tight Schedules. This is a little bit controversial. The un-flexible schedule is the critical reason why I am not that into travel agencies. Though this can 
be loved by some “photo takers” whose goal for trip is to take photos everywhere as the trophy. So identify your goals for travelling at first: for vacation or collecting photos or experiencing various cultures? Then choose different tour packages to be consistent with your goals. For example, the shopping trip package to Hong Kong provides the convenient hotel to stay and the bus for shopping. So you can concentrate on shopping and looking for hot deals and cheap goods.
2. “Unfair” issues. Although I do not want to admit that you may find some unfair issues once you join the travel group. You may find other members paid less than you and you feel being cheated. The price is usually influenced by these factors: price varies with the time; numbers of people register together; and the last moment sale. This is hard to avoid and it is impossible for you to get the cheapest price all the time. The suggestions, rather than solutions, are to compare more travel agencies and gather more companions with you to join this tour.
3.Take you to some shopping malls on purpose. It makes me a little
bit embarrassing to say that when you are a member of the travel agency in China, you need to be careful about this. It seems like to happen in every travel agency, so people here feel nothing unusual. I can understand why this additional item is added in the travel schedules. As the competition among travel agencies is quite tense, they have to reduce the tour service as much as they can. But they are not charities and they need to earn some money from their efforts. One way is to receive some advertisement fees or commissions from those shopping centers. You cannot have a cake and eat it. There is no way to get rid of it. My advice is to accept their arrangements of shopping and enjoy your window shopping.
After presenting these pros and cons of travel agencies in China, my suggestion would be booking China Hotels and airlines through agencies only. And during the tour, you can “rent” a local guide or student with professional tour experience.
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