Travel News Today

ROYAL Brunei Airlines (RBA) and Abacus Distribution Systems Brunei have launched an electronic ticketing (eTicketing) system for their travel agents in Brunei which will enable them to purchase eTickets on RBA flights starting from June 1st, 2007.

According to a press statement, RBA's Vice President of Reservations and Distribution, John Newn said the implementation of eTicketing is a crucial component towards increasing their eTicketing penetration.

«We are pleased to engage Abacus to provide eTicketing capability to Brunei's travel agents. This cutover represents another milestone and progress towards achieving International Air Transport Association's target of 100 per cent eTicketing worldwide by end 2007,» he added.

An eTicket possesses information previously held in a paper ticket where the method is real-time and paperless for travel agents to issue. Individual ticket information is stored within the airline's reservation system and can be retrieved and processed electronically, reducing the amount of paper ticket inventory and hassle in re-issuance of misplaced printed tickets.

Abd Halim Abd Rahman, Sales and Marketing Manager of Abacus Brunei said that Abacus is pleased to provide a solution for RBA to enable local travel agents to issue eTickets.

«The Brunei market is a unique market as Billing and Settlement Plan (BSP) does not exist, thus the solutions for the other BSP markets cannot be implemented here. Abacus is providing a generic electronic transitional automated ticketing (eTAT) for the implementation of eTicketing in Brunei,» he said in the statement.

Through eTicketing, it will be easier for customers to handle itinerary changes especially for last minute travel decisions, provide more effective use of internet capabilities for travel bookings and check-in and provide a welcome relief by making «lost tickets» a thing of the past.

Travel agents will also benefit through savings whereby they would be no more paper stock to manage or printers to maintain.Through the presence of eTicketing services, customer services can be improved where more customers can be serviced over a wider geographical area.

Established in 1990, Abacus Brunei is jointly owned by Royal Brunei Airlines and Abacus International. Abacus Brunei currently has around 30 travel agents with more than 140 terminals spread across the nation's four districts.

(The Brunei Times)