WASHINGTON -- ASTA sent a letter to ARC reiterating its contention
that new rules to limit the void window on airline ticket sales are
unnecessary.
ARC, which will implement the new policy June 4, contends that a
limit on voids is necessary to stem what it views as a growing
problem of travel agents fraudulently voiding airline tickets.
In a statement, ASTA said, "The agency community remains
skeptical about the anti-fraud rationale."
ASTA, as part of ARC's joint advisory board, played a role in
negotiating certain modifications to make the rules more palatable
to agents, but the Society maintains that, even with the
modifications, the policy is not needed.
"We are not agreeing to what they propose. It is a grudging
compromise," said Paul Ruden, ASTA staff senior vice president for
legal and industry affairs.
"We do not think the fraud rationale that [ARC has] put forward
is really the basis of this. And these changes are not going to
have the effect they predict they will have on fraud cases."
Ruden said that although ASTA would prefer the current void
window remain unchanged, the months of meetings with ARC over void
rules produced some positives.
For instance, he said, ARC delayed the start for the new void
rules from April 30 to June 4.
"We also narrowed [the new rules] down to just straight sales,"
Ruden said. "MCO and exchanges still can be modified. Those are
pretty good outcomes."
Meanwhile, ARC began sending e-mail notices to travel agents
explaining, and in some cases clarifying, the new procedures.
ARC originally had stated that under the new guidelines, the
voiding of airline tickets through the GDSs would be limited to the
day of the transaction and up until midnight of the day following
the transaction, with an additional 24 hours for making changes in
IAR Interactive Plus, ARC's Internet-based reporting system.
That could have left the impression that agents using IAR would
have an additional 24 hours to void sales.
However, in the message e-mailed to agents, ARC said agents only
will be able to use IAR to "verify" and alter, if necessary, what
they did in the GDS.
According to ARC, "This additional day is not for customers to
decide to change or cancel their reservation, it is only meant for
agents to verify accuracy in IAR."
An ARC spokesman said, "Say you are approaching 48 hours after
the sale and something is wrong" because the data wasn't
transferred from the GDS.
The extra 24 hours, he said, offers "an additional opportunity
to rectify that."