Flight Data Management, Inc.

Passenger and Cargo Interlining

PRESS RELEASE - We are very pleased to announce the partnership between Amadeus and Flight Data Management. Amadeus and Flight Data Management together make passenger and cargo interline implementation considerably easier, provides comprehensive support equal to that of any other airline and at a price all airlines, even the smallest, can afford.

This agreement allows connection of Flight Data Management's passenger and cargo reservation systems directly to every GDS in the world.

Following is a terse list of the support provided:

Travel, tour, wholesaler or cargo agents to directly book reservations on your airline on a real-time host-to-host basis.
Book reservations directly on other airlines on a real-time host-to-host basis.
Support connection to departure control systems, including SITA's CUTE and AIRINC's MUSE.
SSR message support.
Type B message protocol support.
SITA/ARINC telex messages.
Support for services such as hotel, rental car, catering, etc.

We at Flight Data Management, hope all of you are as excited about the partnership of Flight Data Management and Amadeus as we are.

Dr. Jim Monroe
President
Flight Data Management
eMail: monroe@fdminc.net

Important

In 2007 the airlines of the world have agreed to the following:

Travel Agents will no longer be given free connection to the other airlines. Travel agents will be required to use the Internet for connection to the reservation systems.
The airlines have committed that they will no longer support IATA tickets. They will all support eTickets for their airlines.

These agreements were spearheaded by IATA to reduce the cost of making passenger reservations. A similar effort is underway to reduce the cost of cargo documentation.

Both of these effect passenger interline accounting, as well as interlined passenger reservations.

Our products support both eTickets and standard IATA ticket stock since 1991. Our cargo operation is paperless.

Introduction

A major decision you are faced with when starting a new airline, or as your airline grows, is to determine if it is advisable and financially feasible to provide the ability to have travel or cargo agents and other airlines make reservations on your airline.

The second part of this question is, if you want your agents to make reservations on other passenger or cargo reservation systems.

These decisions have far reaching financial implications to your airline and must be considered very thoroughly by you. This document will address the interline method made available by Flight Data Management and our partner Amadeus. This will allow you to understand what is available as well as provide the basic points involved in your decision making process.

There are many methods to make this happen. We have analyzed these options and have arrived at a solution that is applicable for, in our opinion, all airlines.

The other subjects that must be addressed, regardless of the size of your airline, are booking reservations, accounting, data communication and cost versus potential profit.

The definition of the other terms used in this document are:

Term Definition

Accounting The ability for your airline to account for the inventory booked on your airline by your agents.

Data Communication The communication network required to communicate with entities either within or outside of your airline.

Interlining The ability to have your airline communicate with other airlines for the purpose of sharing inventory space between the airlines.

Interline Accounting The ability to account for the inventory booked on your airline by entities outside of your airline and for your airline to account for inventory booked on other airlines.

Inventory Passengers or cargo space.

Large or Other Airlines or CRS Airlines such as American Airlines, Delta Airlines, United Airlines, etc.. In most cases, it is these airlines that you want to interline cargo and passengers with.

Service Provider Automobiles Rental Agencies, Hotels, Passenger Ship Lines, etc.. Any provider of service needed to satisfactorily complete reservations for clients.

These definitions will be sufficient to provide a basis for our discussion of interlining.

What Is Interlining?

Your need for interlining arose because you wanted:

Travel, tour, wholesaler or cargo agents to directly book reservations on your airline on a real-time host-to-host basis.
Book reservations directly on other airlines on a real-time host-to-host basis.
Support connection to departure control systems, including SITA's CUTE and AIRINC's MUSE.
SSR message support.
Type B message protocol support.
SITA/ARINC telex messages.
Support for services such as hotel, rental car, catering, etc.

These are the main reasons for wanting to be able to send and receive information (interline) to other reservation systems.

The method we will describe will bring the implementation of interlining into the reach of even the smallest airline. And it will not require a staff of your airline personnel to implement it, use it and to maintain it.

Interlining

Travel, tour, wholesaler or cargo agents connect to the reservation system they have contracted with, using their existing equipment and by using the IATA procedural interface that they are already trained on to make the reservations. This provides a convenient and known method for the agents to use to book passengers or cargo on your airline.

The connection from the travel, tour, wholesaler or cargo agents to eTARS/eRES/eTACS is made transparently by Amadeus. The reservation is made directly on eTARS/eRES/eTACS on a real-time basis. The inventory is maintained on the eTARS/eRES/eTACS system not the other reservation system. This reduces your cost as you do not have to pay for your inventory on the other reservation system.

When you book reservations on other airlines the scenarios above are just reversed. However, with eTARS, eRES or eTACS installed, your reservation agents are only concerned with booking reservation between city pairs. If the reservation requires booking on other airline it is handled automatically and transparently to your reservation agents.

If you have travel, tour, cargo agents or other airlines connected directly to your eTARS/eRES/eTACS system, eTARS/eRES/eTACS is capable of interfacing between the travel and tour agents and the other reservation systems where the travel agents are booking the reservations. Also supported is the ability of travel, tour or cargo agents connected to other reservation systems to make reservation on eTARS/eRES/eTACS.

In this case, eTARS/eRES/eTACS provides accounting of each booking to provide for the travel, tour or cargo agents to be paid their commission and to provide for the payment of the booking to the reservation system actual making the reservation. This requires that your airline must be connected to the clearing houses ACH and BSP in order to receive and make payment.

With eTARS, eRES and eTACS a full airline interline accounting package is provided. Review our accounting packages: Click Here

If your airline has eTARS, eRES or eTACS installed all of the above items are implemented.

If your airline has another reservation system installed our solution provides a standard data interface that is easily interfaced to your system. This allows your support group to implementation an integrated solution using your installed reservation system. The required interface can be created by your IT, not programmers, personnel in just a few hours.

If you are a company that provides airline systems for airlines we will provide an implementation for you to provide full interlining for your airline applications.

Implementation

In order to implement this method you only have to tell us to implement it. We will do the rest for you. It is that easy.

We will negotiate and put into place all of the required support needed:

If required bi-lateral agreements with the airlines your wish to interline with.
If required a contract with Amadeus.
Contract with BSP and ACH - Financial clearing houses.
Contract with ATPCO - Publish fares and rules.
Contract with OAG - Publish you airlines schedules

To implement the Flight Data Management interline support, you do not need a contract with Amadeus or bi-lateral agreements with other airlines.

If you already have or will purchase another reservation system, we are prepared to work with them to provide the necessary interface to allow an integrated solution for your airline.

If you are a company that provides airline systems for airlines we are prepared to work with you to interline your applications.

For more information or to place an order contact us at Flight Data Management, Inc. and we will respond to you via email or telephone within 4 hours.