Sabre Travel Network this month launched a settlement service that undercuts the transaction fees ARC charges travel management companies and presents travel managers with more robust charge card billing data.
Sabre partnered with payment system provider Merchant e-Solutions to develop enhancements to the Sabre Magnify Revenue Advantage tool, which Sabre said saves travel management companies 0.6 percent and at least 58 cents per transaction—a savings that could be passed on to TMC customers.
"Travel agencies are billed 3.5 percent and a minimum of 70 cents per transaction by ARC if they're using ARC's solution," said Tim Maher, Sabre Travel Management Solutions marketing manager. "In our world, it's going to be 2.9 percent plus 12 cents. There's clearly a benefit to the agency as the merchant in that it will be a lower-cost solution. They'll also get their expedited cash flow. ARC, typically with agencies, is two weeks cash-flow negative and, with us, we'll settle them on a rolling eight days."
Although ARC conceded that Sabre is charging less per transaction, the company noted Sabre charges a monthly service fee that ARC said it does not charge. Sabre's fees vary based on annual bookings and range between $75 and $300 per month, though Sabre said it waives those fees when an agency signs up for Card Services.
Sabre's tool enables "travel agency customers to process different card types through a single payment processor, settle their agency fees and use Web-based reporting tools within the Revenue Advantage product," the company said.
Following a beta test of the system with Sabre, Adelman Travel Group, Corporate Travel Planners and Robustelli World Travel now are live on the platform. Sabre said the platform is open to any U.S.-based travel management company, adding it currently is "accepting applications."
"We're working with our partner to expand into Canada and other markets," Maher said.
While the tool primarily benefits agencies through reducing fees, Sabre said travel managers will obtain better data on corporate card billings when they use Visa, MasterCard or American Express. Maher said other payment vendors including Discover and UATP are expected.
Maher said the tool has the "ability to actually identify the ticket number on that service fee transaction and have that printed on the cardholder's statement. In today's environment with ARC, you could have the miscellaneous charge order number but you'd have no idea what ticket transaction that actually correlates to. In this case, we can have the airline ticket number correlating to that service fee."
John Henry, Robustelli World Travel CFO and CTO, in a statement said the feature offered "significant cost benefits and additional controls of the fees being charged for the services rendered."