Air ticket transaction fee to go soon

TNN, Mar 13, 2010, 04.46am IST

MUMBAI: The transaction fee that air passengers had to pay to travel agents while booking flights on certain airlines, mostly foreign carriers, will soon be done away with.

Nasim Zaidi, the Director General of Civil Aviation has issued a directive, calling for two changes: First, agents will have to stop charging transaction fee from customers while booking air tickets (the fee is charged by the agents for booking flights of those airlines that do not pay a commission to the travel agent). Second, the directive says airlines that stopped paying commission to agents should start doing so. This way, the agent does not burden the customer with arbitrary transaction fee.

The agents had started charging a fee after many airlines such as KLM, Northwest airlines, Air France, Qatar Airways, Singapore Airlines, Lufthansa, Air Canada, Continental Airlines and Japan Air decided to stop paying a commission to travel agents in November 2008. Other airlines like Austrian, Delta and British Airways followed suit a year later. The agents in turn introduced a transaction fee for booking air tickets on these airlines.

"Air fares will come down for the customer who paid a high quantum of transaction fee to the agent while booking tickets on these airlines. These airlines will not have to pay a commission to the agent, whether they will pass that burden to the passenger remains to be seen," said a travel agent.

The DGCA directive points out that zero-commission by airlines has in fact made the consumer pay extra money in the form of transaction fee. "An unscrupulous agent can charge an exorbitant amount from the customer.

The system of zero-commission also gives rise to market dominance by some big agents, who are paid hefty amounts by the airlines in the name of productivity," said the DGCA directive.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/biz/india-business/Air-ticket-transaction-fee-to-go-soon/articleshow/5678458.cms