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Gujarat High Court stays Air India's move to migrate all ticketing to IndiGo parent's ITQ

BREATHE EASY: Says it is "practically impossible" for travel agents to complete the migration process by the deadline

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In a major interim relief to travel agents, the Gujarat High Court (HC) has put a stay on Air India's (AI) directive asking the agents to migrate the airline's reservation content from the global distribution system (GDS) Amadeus to Travelport by December 4.

The Gujarat HC, in its order issued on Monday, said it was "practically impossible" for the travel agents to complete the migration process by the deadline given by the state-owned carrier.

"It is contended that it is practically impossible for the petitioners and other travel agents to complete that migration process before December 4, 2018," states the order of Justice Vipul M Pancholi.

The court has ordered holding back of Air India's directive "till the next date of hearing." The petition had been filed by Vihar Travel Consultancy.

In a cost-saving move, the national carrier has decided to shift its entire ticketing inventory to a single GDS – Travelport – managed and controlled by InterGlobe Technology Quotient (ITQ).

Curiously, ITQ is part of InterGlobe group that owns low-cost carrier IndiGo, with whom Air India competes in the domestic and short-haul overseas markets.

Air India's decision will lead to the airline not sharing its ticketing content with Amadeus from December 4. Its other two GDS partners – Sabre and Abacus – will also be phased out by January. This will leave Travelport as its sole reservation platform.

The court's basis for granting the "ad-interim relief" to travel agents was that Air India had given very little time to travel agents for carrying out the entire migration process.

The state-owned airline had sent notices to its travel industry partners on "prescribed process" for moving its entire reservation information from Amadeus to Travelport only on November 16.

"It is submitted by learned senior counsels appearing for the petitioners that a notice was issued on 11.10.2018 by the respondent – Air India – that effectively, the POS (point of sale) India available of Air India flights on various GDS platforms will be effective from 4.12.2018 for domestic flights only on Travelport, Sabre and Abacus. However, by way of communication date 16.11.2018, the respondent published migration process and informed the travel partners to migrate from Amadeus to Travelport, prescribing the procedure for the same," the court said.

The government-owned airline has issued a four-page instruction, which has been viewed by DNA Money, last week to travel agents for "handling of PNRs booked on Amadeus for travel after 3rd December".

A letter written by a top executive of Madrid-based information technology (IT) firm Amadeus, which has been viewed by DNA Money, to the minister of state for civil aviation Jayant Sinha early this month has estimated a revenue loss of Rs 1,825 crore to Air India.

The letter claims AI's decision to go for a single GDS platform will also adversely affect "country's image, businesses of Indian agencies and Indian consumers".

Travel agents have also warned that Air India could lose market share as opting for a solo GDS is likely to restrict its reach. They said there were many travel agents who were exclusively on Amadeus, Abacus, Sabre and others.

Many travel agents, who DNA Money spoke to, have said they may not migrate their reservation system to Travelport just for one airline. Instead, they would book their customers on other airlines.

Currently, Amadeus has around 44% global market share followed by Sabre with 39% and Travelport with less than 20%. In the domestic market, Amadeus is the market leader with around 55% share and the rest is with Sabre, Travelport and others.

In terms of passengers, Air India's market share last month was 12.2%, down from 13.3% in January. For IndiGo, it has moved up from 39.7% to 42.8% during the same period.

POSSIBLE FLIGHT

  • In a cost-saving move, Air India has decided to shift its entire ticketing inventory to a single GDS – Travelport – managed and controlled by ITQ
     
  • Travel agents have warned that Air India could lose market share as opting for a solo GDS is likely to restrict its reach
     
  • Many travel agents said they may not migrate their reservation system to Travelport just for one airline. Instead, they would book their customers on other airlines
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