kingjj:

 

For complicated bookings with multiple legs I feel travel agents really earn their coin. It's worth paying a little bit extra for the peace of mind of having someone who knows what they are doing making the bookings. If/when there is an issue it's also good to have someone to go back to to make it right. My mother booked her own flights and accommodation on her last trip to Europe and royally stuffed up, including booking a 'city' hotel that was 70 miles out of the city and messing up her transfers. She ended up paying more at the time to fix her stuff ups than the agent's extra would have been.

 

This is how we do it too. For a weekend trip to Melbourne we organise it ourselves, but for our longer trips further afield we get our travel agent to book it. We have used her for nearly 20 years, she knows what we like and she knows the tricks. We have never had any problems with what she recommends for us and what she has booked for us. Hotels have all been brilliant. My wife and I both have busy jobs so don't really have the time to do a lot of organising before we go, and our holidays aren't long enough to leave it till we get somewhere to arrange things to do. It's like having a project manager to manage your holiday for you!

Another benefit is if things go wrong - we were in the south of France when the Nice terrorist attack happened, and our agent had called us to see if we were ok, before we even were aware it had happened. Another time a company got a pickup location mixed up and our agent sorted it out while we were in the pub or sleeping or something. It just makes things easier and holidays more relaxing.  

Edit: this isn't to say we don't organise anything ourselves. We often sort out our own accommodation (house swap, stay with family), leave spare time to find our own activities etc.