Agent #125 in Saudi Arabia has the cleanest record on this blog: 555 orders over four years and zero refunds. That is not luck, and the way he does it is copyable.
A travel or visa office has something most businesses selling anything have to buy: people who already trust you with their passport. The question is only what else you can usefully do for them once they are sitting across the desk.
Who this is
A small travel and visa agency in Saudi Arabia, registered with us in December 2021. Figures below are as of 5 December 2025 — four years.
He works mainly as a reseller: he collects the client’s details, submits the application himself, buys the document at his discount, and charges the client his own price. We never pay him; his income is the difference between what he charges and what he pays us.
Four years, measured
| Paid orders | 555 |
| Cancellations | 0 |
| Orders per month | about 11-12 |
| His price to the client | $120 (his own figure) |
| His current rate | 47% |
Saudi outbound travel has no real off-season — clients go to Asia, Europe and the Gulf year-round — and the order flow reflects that. It is a trickle rather than a wave, month after month, for four years.
What zero cancellations is actually made of
Five hundred and fifty-five orders without a single refund is unusual enough to deserve an explanation, and his is mechanical rather than magical:
- he collects detailed client data through his own website form, so nothing is missing before he starts;
- he reviews every application himself before submitting;
- he types clean, verified data into the dashboard by hand — no bulk uploads, no client-entered forms full of typos.
That is the whole trick. Errors are what cause refunds, and he removes the step where errors get in. Every partner in these case studies with a near-perfect record works the same way.
The economics, shown honestly
Digital-only documents have averaged around $40 at base price over these four years — somewhat lower in 2021-2023 than today. At his current 47% rate the document costs him about $21, so on a $120 sale his margin is close to $99.
Multiply by 555 and you get roughly $50,000-55,000 over four years, or about $1,100 a month. We give that as a range rather than a single number on purpose: he climbed the ladder as his order count grew, so his earliest orders carried smaller discounts than his most recent ones, and we are not going to publish a precise-looking figure built on an average we have smoothed. The monthly rate is the honest unit here, and it is the one you can compare to your own office.
The hybrid part, which matters more than it sounds
Most of the time he handles the application personally. But travel is travel, and sometimes the client has already left the country before the paperwork is done.
When that happens he switches: he sends his referral link or QR code, the client completes the application from wherever they are, the order still appears in his dashboard, and he is credited automatically. He earns less on those — a referral share instead of a reseller’s markup — but the alternative was earning nothing.
Both order types sit in one list in the dashboard. There is no separate tracking to maintain and nothing to reconcile. For an agency whose clients are, by definition, in motion, not losing the sale to a departure gate is worth real money over four years.
Two ways to earn, one ladder
Partners work with us in one of two ways. They pay differently, and it is worth knowing which one you are reading about before you compare numbers.
Reselling. You buy the document at your discount and charge your client whatever you decide. The difference is yours. You invoice the client; IDA never pays you anything. Your income depends on the price you set, so two resellers with identical volume can earn very different amounts.
Referral. You share a link, a QR code or an embedded form. Your client orders from IDA directly and pays IDA’s price. We then pay you a share of it. You set no prices and handle no money, so the income per order is fixed — and lower than a reseller’s markup usually is.
Both use the same ladder, and your position on it is set by how many orders you have placed:
| Orders | Your rate |
|---|---|
| 1st | 15% |
| 2nd-10th | 30% |
| 11th-30th | 33% |
| 31st-50th | 35% |
| 51st-100th | 37% |
| 101st-300th | 40% |
| 301st-500th | 43% |
| 501st-1,000th | 47% |
| 1,001st onward | 50% |
For a reseller the rate is a discount off the price you pay us. For a referral partner it is the share of the order we pay you. Same percentage, different direction.
One consequence worth stating plainly: reselling pays more per order than referring. In the one case on this blog where we know the reseller’s price, the margin is close to $99 per document; the referral partner in our Sri Lanka case averages roughly $18 per sale. Referring is far less work per order, so the right choice depends on whether your constraint is time or client flow.
Three ways to put it in front of your clients
At the desk. A QR code on the counter, a link in WhatsApp, a line in your confirmation email. The client orders on their own phone. Least work, and it survives staff turnover because nobody has to learn anything.
On your own website. Either a plain referral link, or our widget — an order form embedded in your own page. The client fills it in and pays on your site at IDA’s prices, and the order arrives tagged to you. You generate the snippet yourself in your agent dashboard; one key is tied to one domain, and you choose the language and currency it displays. Some of our partners run comparison and booking sites and place it exactly this way.
You submit for the client. You fill in the application yourself in your dashboard, using the documents the client has already handed you. This is the most work per order and by a wide margin the most reliable: every partner in these case studies with a near-zero cancellation rate works this way. Clean data in, no refunds out.
Partners who run their own systems and sustained volume can also integrate with our API directly. That runs under a separate agreement rather than as a self-service feature — if your volume is there and you want your own booking or CRM system to create orders, write to us and we will talk it through.
How the money actually reaches you
If you resell, there is nothing to wait for: you have already charged the client, and your cost was settled with us at your discounted rate.
If you refer, the money comes from us, and the timing has rules worth knowing before you start:
- An order is credited to you roughly a month after the client pays — not on the day of the sale. Credits are processed in a daily batch.
- You will see each order move through Not paid → Waiting for credit → Waiting for issued in your dashboard, so nothing is hidden from you.
- A refund reverses the credit. This is why the partners with the lowest cancellation rates earn the most predictable income.
- The cookie lasts 30 days. If your client clicks your link today and orders three weeks later, it still counts as yours.
- Payouts go out by PayPal, by bank transfer in 60+ currencies, or in USDT.
One limitation to know in advance, because it surprises people: you are credited for new clients only. If someone already has an IDA account that is not linked to any partner, their next order does not become yours, even if they reach us through your link. In practice this rarely bites — most of the people you refer have never ordered from us before — but you should hear it from us rather than discover it in your dashboard.
Why travel and visa offices do well at this
Look at what the office already has: a steady flow of people who need documents handled, an established habit of handing over passports and personal details, a working process for collecting data, and clients who actively prefer getting everything done in one place.
Nothing about adding this requires new capability. It is the same work, applied to one more form, for the same people. And because you control the data entry, the zero-cancellation outcome above is genuinely available to you rather than being a quirk of one unusually careful partner.
Getting started
Registration is at https://idaoffice.org/agent/register/ and takes a few minutes. There is nothing to buy, nothing to install, and no minimum volume.
Once you are in, you have a dashboard with your orders and balance, your referral link and QR code, the widget generator if you want the form on your own site, and your current rate — which moves up the ladder by itself as your order count grows.
What this needs from you is not effort so much as consistency. Every partner in these case studies does the same unremarkable thing: they mention it every time the moment comes up, not only when they remember to.
Evidence
Dashboard screenshots: order list and balance, personal data removed.
More partner case studies
- A one-shop scooter rental in Sri Lanka: 355 sales in eight months, with the payouts shown
- A recruiting office in Malta: 720 documents over five and a half years
- A multiservice office in Kentucky: what the program looks like at three orders a month
FAQ
Does this work if my client has already left the country?
Yes — that is exactly what the referral link is for. They complete the application from wherever they are and the order is still credited to you. You earn the referral share rather than a reseller’s markup on those, so it is worth catching people before they fly where you can.
Do visa services do better than travel agencies?
Visa offices often convert a little better, because document preparation is already what clients come to them for. Travel agencies usually have more clients. In practice both work; the difference is smaller than the difference between making the offer consistently and making it occasionally.
My clients are price-sensitive. What should I charge?
That is yours to decide, and it is the main lever you have — the partner in this case charges $120, but his market is not yours. Your cost is the base price minus your rate, and everything above it is margin. If you compete on price, a smaller markup with more volume works; if clients come to you for speed and reliability, they will pay for it.
Do I need a licence or a special legal status to do this?
No. You keep operating as the business you already are, acting as an agent or reseller for IDA documents. Local rules on invoicing and tax are yours to follow as with any other service you sell, so if anything is unclear where you are, check with a local accountant or lawyer.
What exactly is the document my client receives?
An International Driving Permit issued by IDA: a translation of the details on your client’s national driving licence into a standard multilingual format. It is carried together with their national licence, never instead of it, and acceptance differs from country to country. Tell your clients this plainly — partners who set expectations correctly are the ones with no cancellations.
What happens if a client asks for a refund?
The order is reversed and so is your credit. This is the single strongest argument for checking applications before submitting them rather than after.
How much can I realistically make?
Multiply your own numbers rather than ours: how many clients a month plausibly need this, times your margin per document. The cases on this blog range from roughly 3 orders a month to roughly 44. What they have in common is not volume — it is that the offer is made every time, as part of the routine.
I have more questions.
Write to us before you register if you would rather. We would much rather answer them now than have you discover something in month three.
Published December 06, 2025 • 9m to read
