<B> Inside Track</B>
<B>AA Offers E-Tix Systemwide, E-Mail Receipts</B>
American Airlines said last week that, as of Oct. 15, it will become the first airline to implement electronic ticketing capability for its entire worldwide system. The expansion will bring e-ticketing to all 44 countries served by American and American Eagle. The 78 additional e-ticketing markets available include cities in Canada, the Caribbean, Japan, Mexico and all of Central and South America.
AA officials said system enhancements that will allow travel agents in international cities to book e-tickets are being planned. The airline also will begin offering e-ticket itinerary confirmation and receipts by e-mail. "We currently offer confirmations and receipts on e-tickets by mail, by fax or in person at the airport," said Frank DiNuzzo, American's managing director of marketing performance. "Adding e-mail capability for the confirmations will help our business travelers handle last-minute travel plans more efficiently."
<a name="story2"><B>Bass Announces Quarterly Results</B>
Bass Hotels & Resorts, London, announced the first quarterly earnings results of its U.S. hotels last month. Bass, with an Oct. 1 through Sept. 30 fiscal year, is the parent company of Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Inter-Continental Hotels & Resorts and Staybridge Suites.
Holiday Inn's revenue per available room increased by 5.9 percentage points to $45.54 for the nine months ending June 30. Occupancies declined by 0.1 percent to 63.4 percent. The Express brand increased its RevPar by 5.7 percent to $37.25 in those nine months and received a 61.4 percent occupancy, an increase of 0.6 percentage points. Crowne Plaza's RevPar increased by 4.1 percent to $69.90 during that same time period, with occupancies dipping 1.0 percent to 68.7 percent. Inter-Continental's RevPar and occupancy results were not available. Room supply increased in the Express and Crowne Plaza brands, while Holiday Inn decreased its supply by 4.9 percent as of June 30.
<a name="story3"><B>Amex's Bulk Buying Picks Up Steam</B>
American Express is seeing some success after announcing it bought discounted Continental Airlines seats on Virgin Atlantic flights to London (<I>BTN,</I> June 15). Amex's senior vice president of corporate services Jud Linville told Business Travel News that after an initial slow opening month, a total of 500 accounts now are involved in the program. Half of Amex's Northeast customers are involved. The London route alone accounts for $80 million.
<a name="story4"><B>Pegasus Enhances Hotel Res Capabilities</B>
Pegasus Systems, based in Dallas, announced last week that it is providing Hotel Reservations Network booking capabilties and hotel source information. The reservation network will hold information on more than 22,000 hotels in 165 countries. The link will give the network's Website access to the same hotel reservation and confirmation capabilities offered on Travel Web, Pegasus Systems' consumer retail site.
In other Pegasus news, Westmark Hotels, based in Seattle, has become a client of The Hotel Industry Switch Company (THISCO). Westmark has 14 hotels in Alaska and Canada's Yukon Territory on the Galileo, Sabre and Worldspan global distribution systems.
<a name="story5"><B>Rosenbluth Puts IPO On Back Burner</B>
Rosenbluth International has tabled plans to go forward with a public offering for his family-owned travel agency. Hal Rosenbluth intends to wait until the stock market rebounds before setting a new timetable.
<a name="story6"><B>Defense Previews End-To-End System</B>
The Defense Travel System and its industry partner TRW this week premiered the Defense Department's new end-to-end travel solution that will be implemented nationwide by 2001. Col. Al Arnold, project manager for DTS, told BTN that testing for the new program will run from November 1998 through March 1999, with the system initially phasing in at bases within the 11-state Defense Travel Region 6 as existing contracts in those states expire. The states are: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin. This area includes approximately 200,000 DOD travelers. The centerpiece of the new system is a Common User Interface automation program, which is being developed by TRW and is based on Gelco Travel Manager software.
The system will link CRS and Defense Department travel data, allowing the government to save about $300 million annually in administrative overhead when the program is fully deployed in the 18 continental U.S. DOD travel regions. Overhead on DOD travel is currently about 30 percent, compared with 8 percent or less in the private sector. American Express, one of the partners on the TRW team, will handle the travel management services for DTR-6.