Thaiflyer From Thailand, joined Oct 2007, 28 posts, RR: 0 Posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 21 hours ago) and read 2400 times:
KLM announced today that they only use e-tickets from first of June this year. ( that's correct from tomorrow ! ).
Some travel company's reacted by saying that people can have problems when travelling with e-tickets on some airports as not all airports and airlines are ready for 100% e-tickets.
Even KLM partner in Panama doesn't accept e-tickets.
Myself had never problems with my e-tickets but then i don't travel to small and remote airports.
What do you think, will this create problems for travelers and how to solve this possible problem for them.
JGPH1A From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 2, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 21 hours ago) and read 2357 times:
Quoting Caribillo (Reply 1): IATA, and the 240 companies on it, will use only e.tckets from monday 2nd June.
Correction. IATA BSP's will only be accepting ticketing transactions from travel agents on e-tickets from 1st June. Airlines ticketing on their own stock for flights on their own flight numbers are not forced to move to 100% e-ticket, although many have. The issue is with BSP (Bank Settlement Plan) and interline.
As has been stated, the principle obstacle to all airlines going 100% e-ticket now is airport ground handling. Some airport systems are not fully connected to the e-ticket servers of all their handled airlines, and some airports don't have systems at all, or at least only have old and unreliable systems, or unreliable power/telecoms. Until this is resolved, not all airlines will be able to go 100% e-ticket, and many agencies will have to revert to direct airline ticketing on airline stock (as opposed to neutral BSP stock).
Leskova From Germany, joined Oct 2003, 6075 posts, RR: 72 Reply 3, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 20 hours ago) and read 2145 times:
Quoting JGPH1A (Reply 2): IATA BSP's will only be accepting ticketing transactions from travel agents on e-tickets from 1st June.
And, as was to be expected, airlines are once again showing their complete incompetence in terms of getting things organized quickly and based on one standard...
There are still problems with some airports (as you pointed out as well), there are problems with groups, there are problems with infants, there are problems with itineraries with more than 16 sectors (including surface sectors), there are problems with open segments, ...
And instead of agreeing on one standard way of processing these problems, we've now got different procedures from just about every airline. They may be similar in some cases, but lots of different nuances.
And the worst thing is: the airlines' complete lack of comprehensive planning is something that we now need to pay for (or, in other words, that we now need to charge our customers for), because for those cases in which we're not able to issue eTickets (for whatever reasons), some airlines actually have the gall to charge a processing fee.
... damn... I'd love to do something like that once in a while: I completely mess up the planning that I'm responsible for (with a target date that I've known about for years), and I can force someone else to pay for it... unbelievable... a reward for incompetence.
It'll probably end up as the usual show of incompetence that we always got when we sent PTAs to airlines: we called them to confirm the price, each and every tax on the ticket and any fees that arise. We then got the PTA rejected because the airline was incapable of processing a PTA the same day (that we sent in 5-6 hours before their respective office closed)... we confirmed everything again, got the PTA rejected again, because they messed up another time... and so on...
At a conference that I attended, some airline representatives even tried blaming IATA for the introduction of the 100% eTicketing rule... as if the airlines had nothing to do with that...
Fortunately, at least some carriers have managed to come very close to 100% eTicket-ability, even if only by means of cutting off interline agreements with some airlines that weren't compliant yet, and were very unlikely to be until today.
JGPH1A From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 6, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 17 hours ago) and read 1850 times:
Quoting SQ773 (Reply 4): I have been wondering myself how an stand by ticket can be issued electronically ....
Any idea ??
Yes. It is possible to issue partially or full open e-tickets, with a valid carrier and routing only without specific flight number or dates for the coupons. The non-rev passenger can then list as standby for travel, or just turn up at the airport. The open e-ticket is normally indexed against a credit card number, and so can be retrieved by the airport agent and used for travel.
Quoting Andaman (Reply 5): Is it just a natural step for most of the airliners? AY said of all the tickets they sold in April 96% were e-tickets.
It is a natural progression, and for almost all straightforward travel an e-ticket works fine. It is the tricky ones (infants, groups, interlines, small or non-automated airports) where not all airlines are fully capable yet. 96% is fairly easy, that last 4% is going to be a real pig.
Rjnut From United States of America, joined Dec 1999, 1168 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 1779 times:
I found a really good fare DOH-DXB-CDG-YYC-BOS-CDG-DXB-DOH using AF -AC- and QR , but QR and AF do not have interline e tkt agreement and the traveler was not ready to commit to purchase by June 1st and i explained that I would not be able to issue the ticket after that as it would have to be electronic!
Goldorak From France, joined Sep 2006, 1677 posts, RR: 3 Reply 9, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 1654 times:
Quoting Rjnut (Reply 7): I found a really good fare DOH-DXB-CDG-YYC-BOS-CDG-DXB-DOH using AF -AC- and QR , but QR and AF do not have interline e tkt agreement and the traveler was not ready to commit to purchase by June 1st and i explained that I would not be able to issue the ticket after that as it would have to be electronic!
That's an interesting case. How such a case will be handled after june 1st ?
I had a similar situation recently : I booked at a AF call center a single itinerary : CDG-ORD (AF) - IND (US flight number but flight operated by UA) - MCI (NW) - SLC (DL) - SFO (DL) - CDG (AF). So an entire skyteam ticket except the ORD-IND. AF told me they have to issue a paper ticket due to no e-ticket agreement with US.
JGPH1A From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 10, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 1641 times:
Quoting Goldorak (Reply 9): That's an interesting case. How such a case will be handled after june 1st ?
I had a similar situation recently : I booked at a AF call center a single itinerary : CDG-ORD (AF) - IND (US flight number but flight operated by UA) - MCI (NW) - SLC (DL) - SFO (DL) - CDG (AF). So an entire skyteam ticket except the ORD-IND. AF told me they have to issue a paper ticket due to no e-ticket agreement with US.
AF do seem to be taking a long time to implement e-ticket interline agreements. It's even worse for their hosted carriers.
QB737 From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 11, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 1618 times:
Quoting Rjnut (Reply 7): found a really good fare DOH-DXB-CDG-YYC-BOS-CDG-DXB-DOH using AF -AC- and QR , but QR and AF do not have interline e tkt agreement and the traveler was not ready to commit to purchase by June 1st and i explained that I would not be able to issue the ticket after that as it would have to be electronic!
I did enter a similar routing in Apollo and quoted it. I got a message saying that it can be ticketed on Ac stock since AC has agreements with both AF and QR.
QB737 From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 12, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 1573 times:
That's an interesting case. How such a case will be handled after june 1st ?
I had a similar situation recently : I booked at a AF call center a single itinerary : CDG-ORD (AF) - IND (US flight number but flight operated by UA) - MCI (NW) - SLC (DL) - SFO (DL) - CDG (AF). So an entire skyteam ticket except the ORD-IND. AF told me they have to issue a paper ticket due to no e-ticket agreement with US.
Have you checked with a travel agent? I entered a similar routing in Apollo and I can issue an electronic ticket for the whole itinerary using US plate.
Quoting JGPH1A (Reply 2): Correction. IATA BSP's will only be accepting ticketing transactions from travel agents on e-tickets from 1st June. Airlines ticketing on their own stock for flights on their own flight numbers are not forced to move to 100% e-ticket, although many have. The issue is with BSP (Bank Settlement Plan) and interline.
It's not just KLM and Cathay - it's every airline that's a member of IATA, for sales through travel agents.
Goldorak From France, joined Sep 2006, 1677 posts, RR: 3 Reply 14, posted (5 years 2 weeks 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1543 times:
Quoting QB737 (Reply 12): Have you checked with a travel agent? I entered a similar routing in Apollo and I can issue an electronic ticket for the whole itinerary using US plate.
Thanks for searching . It's may be because I booked through AF call center and they can probably only emit tickets on their own stock (057). So I had the pleasure to have paper tickets !!