It's possible.
Some may say airlines are moving away from the idea of supporting ancillary service sales with financial incentives. After working on our latest ancillary service solution in partnership with Corsair, we're not so sure.
Corsair is setting a new industry precedent by being the first airline to pay commission to travel agents upselling their offer exclusively through the Amadeus system. They're essentially paving the way to strategically differentiating themselves through a new commission payment scheme. And ... we're expecting more airlines to follow.
Corsair was our launch partner for Amadeus Ancillary Services in 2010. They were also the first to distribute their ancillary services in Amadeus Selling Platform through an integrated catalogue, and now, we're proud to be taking our partnership one step further. Being integrally involved in such a key initiative means our technology has the opportunity to ultimately benefit the entire travel ecosystem.
By using existing processes, we are facilitating the payment of commissions on ancillary services sales to travel agents. Amadeus is effectively enabling a competitive advantage for airlines that choose to employ commission schemes for ancillary products, and we're the first GDS to take part in such a major evolution.
[Last] week at IFTM Top Resa in Paris, Corsair announced that for the first time, travel agents exclusively connected to the Amadeus system will receive automated commission payments and reinforce their value to customers when booking select Corsair ancillary services, including excess baggage and preferred seating, with the prospect of eventually expanding to all services in all markets worldwide.
The solution? The commission is automatically added in the PNR at ancillary pricing time. An airline is able to update their policy at any time using the flexibility of ATPCo's ancillary services filing. At EMD issuance, the commission gets reported to the BSP which processes the commission calculation and payment to the travel agent.
We expect this fully integrated process to benefit all travel industry players, from travel agencies enhancing offers to travelers and, in turn, their sales volumes to airlines effectively maximizing their ancillary revenue stream through a quick and efficient solution.
With a simple, easily implemented, fully automated, seamless solution prepared and ready for market, we believe this initiative is fundamentally changing the ancillary services game. Both airlines and travel agencies now have a new, streamlined and successful commercial model at their fingertips.
Frederic Hoff is manager of distribution product management at Amadeus IT Group. This post, originally published on an Amadeus blog, is republished with permission from Amadeus.