IATA's move to 100% electronic ticketing is 'a pig's ear', according to travel agency consortium Advantage. It says that differing procedures for issuing e-tickets on different airlines and GDSs risks confusion at best, and could even open its members up to prosecution.
The consortium has sent letters to a number of major airlines, asking for clarification on a number of procedures that will come into effect on June 1, the deadline that IATA has set for the phase-out of paper tickets.
In the letter Advantage asks the airlines, which include British Airways, Air France, Lufthansa and Virgin Atlantic, for concrete details of how they will handle interline traffic and presses them to provide detailed manuals of their procedures for each GDS.
The association is worried that travellers without through e-tickets to their final destination may have to disembark in a country and check in their baggage again. Advantage's director of business travel Norman Gage says that if a passenger dies in that country, it will leave airlines open to prosecution under the new Corporate Manslaughter Act.
Mr Gage also says that paper ticket rules for itineraries not covered by e-ticketing are outdated. He told businesstravelworld.com: 'This is turning the clock back 30 years, with individual airlines having their own paper stock and with different processes for handling them.'
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