ATPCO Commits to ‘Dynamic’ Airline Offers

ATPCO has committed to build the “framework needed” for 80 percent of all airline offers to be “dynamically” created by 2026, the company announced Tuesday at its annual Elevate conference in Washington, D.C. Dynamic offers are generated at the time of search, instead of filed within ATPCO’s system.

“Our mission is to drive innovation and efficiencies in the industry, and we envision a future in which the industry can fundamentally move from file fares to dynamic offers,” APTCO president and CEO Alex Zoghlin said.

While current airfare searches may be centered on schedules and fares, ATPCO sees a future in which service attributes are key search elements too. As an example, Zoghlin cited a search for a flight with a lay-back seat with Wi-Fi, generating a dynamic offer. Today, that search would begin with schedule and price, then would be filtered to find the desired elements.

“It’s so that customers can pick exactly what they are looking for and give those to suppliers so they can get better at curating those products,” he said.

One solution ATPCO announced to support processing dynamic offers is airline order posting, a process that aims to solve the challenge of servicing and settling offers that don’t go through the traditional fare-filing process. “This is something we have worked with two major North American airlines on,” ATPCO chief strategy officer Tom Gregorson said. “It’s in [proof of concept] right now.”

ATPCO’s process will allow dynamically created orders, after the sale, to be integrated into the same ATPCO datasets that are used for servicing and settlement today, according to the company. That data then would be distributed to any downline systems that an airline uses to support their reissues, refunds or passenger revenue accounting processes.

“[Airlines] don’t have to wait until they are up 100 percent on One Order, which may take several years,” Gregorson said, referring to the International Air Transport Association’s initiative to simplify airline reservation, delivery and accounting systems by gradually phasing out the current booking and ticketing records and combining those multiple records into a single retail and customer-focused order. “They can unlock that dynamic fare adjustment today and get all their current servicing and functionality in one place. That’s huge value.”

With airline order posting, “airlines are filing and ATPCO is sending only the fares that were actually sold, which is more efficient and economical for everyone,” according to the company.

Freeing NDC Code

In addition, ATPCO announced Tuesday it will provide its New Distribution Capability Exchange source code to the industry for free in the hope that it accelerates NDC adoption. “The global adoption of NDC is important because it will allow each airline to create their own dynamic customer offers and make them available on any and all channels where they wish to participate,” according to the company.

The previous cost for the NDC Exchange source code varied by customer based on transaction volume and usage, according to ATPCO.

Further, ATPCO is creating a design group for those involved in NDC. “Whether an airline, a system or technology provider, you do not have to be an ATPCO customer or community participant,” Zoghlin said, adding that the group’s goal is to start to solve for the noted problems or complaints about NDC.

Donna M. Airoldi www.businesstravelnews.com