The Hindu Business Line : Travel agents demur on e-ticketing compliance

Mumbai, May 24 If you are planning to travel abroad to multiple destinations, your trip is likely to become cumbersome, time-consuming and expensive in the near future, says the Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI).

The International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) decision to go in for 100 per cent e-ticketing comes into effect from June 1 and this is likely to complicate the process of booking a multiple itinerary ticket, TAAI says.

Explaining with an example, Mr C.V. Prasad, President of TAAI told newspersons, “If a passenger is flying Indian Airlines and Japan Airlines on a Mumbai-Bangkok-Tokyo-Bangkok-Mumbai route, he would have to pay over Rs 33,000 extra in the case of an e-ticket!

“This is because the two airlines only have a paper-ticket agreement; to issue an e-ticket two sets of tickets will have to be issued by the agent.”

Of the 7-8 million international tickets issued from India, close to 1.5 million or 20 per cent are paper tickets, TAAI said.

However, in domestic travel, about 95 per cent of the tickets issued are e-tickets.

According to IATA guidelines, if a travel agent is unable to issue an e-ticket on a specific route, he or she has to instruct the airline to issue a paper ticket. Only airlines would have the mandate to issue paper tickets from June 1.

Courier charges

“Now when we send this online instruction to the airline to issue a paper ticket, the process will take at least 72 hours and then the paper ticket will be sent by courier to the agent,” Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI) Vice-President, Mr Pradip Lulla told Business Line. TAFI is supporting TAAI on the issue.

Moreover, it would involve nearly Rs 20 crore additional expenditure for the agents on courier charges, Mr Prasad said.

This charge is likely to be passed on to the passengers.

Talking specifically about Air India, he said the national carrier is not 100 per cent e-ticket enabled and it would not be in the country’s interest yet to implement the system.

He added that the association plans to take up the issue with the Civil Aviation Ministry and has sought a meeting with the Minister, Mr Praful Patel.

‘Air India is ready’

However, Air India’s spokesperson told Business Line that barring a few destinations in CIS countries and other not so important destinations, the carrier will meet the May 31 deadline to become fully e-ticket enabled.

“It is incorrect to say that because of Air India, India cannot meet the deadline for e-ticketing,” he added.

More Stories on : Airlines | E-Commerce & E-Business | Travel & Places

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Travel agents demur on e-ticketing compliance

Smooth take-off for Bangalore’s new airport

Low-cost Vayu Vajras a big hit