A group of Swedish travel buyers last week told The Transnational that it hopes to use emerging
electronic miscellaneous document technology not only to capture ancillary
airline fee data for negotiating purposes but also to provide a data platform
for breaking down and tracking all cost elements of an air trip. Consisting of
large multinational members of the Swedish Business Travel Association, SBTA
Global Network has drawn up a list of 24 air travel elements it would like to
consolidate in a single management information system.
Network administrator Cathrine Lundberg said top priorities
are fuel charges, lounge access, fast-track security, airline rebooking fees,
seat reservations, inflight Internet access, ticket refunds and taxes and
levies. Fast-track security and lounge access are not necessarily charged by
the airline, either within the base fare or through ancillary fees, but might
be imposed by airports and other third parties. SBTA Global Network considers
the development of EMDs and other ancillary charging mechanisms to be an
opportunity to obtain a total trip cost by integrating fees for those services
with what corporate customers pay airlines.
"Ancillary charges are a big issue for us, but we are
trying to see what opportunities there are to include other things in the
negotiated price for large buyers," said Lundberg. "There is an
opportunity to package other features independent of who owns them, such as
fast-track airport access. If we are going to load all these different services
on to the ticket, we have to figure out how to collect them electronically so
they can all be shown on our card data."
In the six months it has been working on the project, SBTA
Global Network has spoken with airlines and a card company and also wants to
talk to airport operators. It also has engaged in dialogue with Amadeus, which
is the dominant global distribution system operator in the Nordic region.
Amadeus since June has been piloting with Finnair its EMD solution on the
airline side of its business, and Lundberg welcomed the last week's
announcement that Amadeus will pilot EMD access for travel agents in Finland
from the first quarter of 2011. Amadeus claimed the Finnish rollout will make
it the first GDS to make the EMD--the equivalent of an e-ticket for additional
airline charges--available to travel agents.
Amadeus Scandinavia marketing director Jesper Söderström
said he understands the aims of SBTA Global Network. "They fear that more
of their expenses are not being included in the cost of a flight and therefore
the actual price is not the same as travelers think it is," he said.
"They want to get the facts and then gain control. From a corporate point
of view, they want to know if they can follow the data and if they can make
agreements based on the information. It is like negotiating free Internet
access at a hotel. They may tell the airline they want free speedy boarding and
half-price for sandwiches. It would give a huge amount of flexibility. Our job
as a technology provider is to make this process feasible."
However, before SBTA Global Network's principles become
practice, there are several significant hurdles to overcome. Not the least of
these is that while Amadeus and other GDSs are starting to make the technology
available for corporate clients to book and track ancillary charges through
their travel management companies, the airlines need to buy into the process.
Even in Finland, the Amadeus EMD laboratory, airline cooperation remains
uncertain.
"We haven't receive a lot of information about what
airlines will sell through the EMD," said Samuli Sakari, development
manager for Area Travel Agency in Helsinki. "Finnair hasn't released any
information yet. We are piloting the functionality, not the service itself. The
functionality is already there, but what is missing is the services the
airlines will put in the system. This is going to be a great opportunity for
the airlines, but someone needs to start it."
Amadeus' Söderström acknowledged the problem to BTN, adding that some airlines, as has
been indicated in the United States, may choose to sell some or all their
ancillary services only through direct channels. "The product is there; we
need to have the airlines able and wanting to do this," he said.
"However, if the GDSs are responsible for 60 percent of their sales, then
not making ancillary services available through them is not a good choice."
Source: The Transnational