American Airlines has reiterated claims it wants to reach a “fair settlement” with Sabre and customers booking GDS-connected agents will not be affected in the upcoming antitrust trial.
In a letter to agents this week, vice president of global sales, Derek DeCross, says the carrier expects the trial to conclude by mid-December and a new relationship will be in place “under a new agreement” within 14 days of its end.
Jury selection was due to begin on 9 October ahead of evidence being heard from 22 October in the Texas State Court, the culmination of months of preparation in the midst of the carrier also being involved in continued rumours about its future and a possible merger with US Airways.
The case centres on the long-running saga (with claims and counter-claims) over American’s move to provide flight information directly to travel agents rather than going through the the global distribution systems, using its famed Direct-Connect model.
Hearings have been pushed back fairly regularly throughout 2012 as both sides have pored over one another’s agreements and contracts.
But with the end now nigh, at least in terms of the trial, American is probably looking to ease concerns circulating in the agency community that the ability to make bookings may be affected in the coming weeks.
DeCross says:
“I want to emphasize that regardless of what happens before, during or after the trial, American fully intends to continue participating in Sabre to ensure no disruption of your ability to continue booking American flights.”
Jury deliberations are due to begin on 11 December.
NB: American Airlines aircraft image via Shutterstock.
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About Kevin May
One of the biggest problems faced by (business travel) agents (can’t speak for the leisure types) is the dis-integration of information across channels. It is not so much an issue with the junk-fare airlines as they are mainly short haul point to point stuff (though there is a case for an efficient GDS for these airlines).
When we turn to the legacy airline structure, with the vital need of the ability to interline and use things such as Minimum Connecting Times, it is a different story. Airlines can offer extra bags and seat assignments on their own websites, if they wish to charge extra for these things – that is not an issue. Business travel agents need to move people about the planet and as long as that can be achieved, how airlines wish to irritate the hell out of their higher revenue clients by throwing in loads of ad-hoc charges is up to them. Frankly, having these “extras” on the airlines website is a bit of a blessing as a) We agents do not get involved in a load of non-revenue earning extras an b) the client is at liberty to louse up their own seating arrangements etc – one less thing to have to worry about.
Now, If American elect to come off the GDS system (and that is a commercial decision for them to make) and decided to emphasis this direct connect system, then there is a good chance it will do substantive damage to their premium revenue – why? Because if I need to get a biz class passenger from London to New York, I need to be able to do it on one blue-screen (of whatever GDS) and I am not going to faff about checking several different systems. I need to compare timings, fares and what-not with a few entry lines …. and not across several systems and certainly not with a point and click system with a mouse, which is far too slow and cumbersome.
Of course, techys say that people will do their stuff themselves and online. Not so. They have been saying that for ages. Thing is, firms pay their executives to land multi-million dollar deals … and not to play about on the internet trying to work out how best to fit NYC to LAX to TYO to SEL to NYC together in the most cost effective way, only to find that the executive arrives in LAX and has to re-vamp the whole thing but he has no idea who to get hold of and the only option is to buy a whole new ticket and and and…. So, the business travel agent remains and as such need to be able to get what we want at a one stop shop. In other words, the GDS.
So, I don’t know where this case is going. Sure, there may be “issues” that the GDS and Airline fraternity may need to fix. I am sure their contracts are things the lawyers can rack up a nice bunch of fees over; but if the upshot is a sudden duplicity of channels of information supply, one more victory for American, if they were to get a victory, and they would be done for.
Be careful what you wish for … you may just get it.