AUSTIN, Texas -- Grand Adventures Tour and Travel Publishing Corp.
(GATT) here has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit over a software
program that allegedly could not handle its busy telephone
reservation center and led to a critical loss of key data.
GATT, a travel arranger and publishing company that provides
travel and tour programs to airline industry employees and
honeymooners, alleges that the TourTek inventory management and
reservation system software never worked in the manner promised and
ultimately crashed its entire computer system.
GATT seeks $15 million in economic damages, and $3 million in
mental anguish damages and treble damages.
Defendants in the lawsuit, filed in the District Court of Travis
County, Texas, are Orbit Network Inc., formerly a Novato, Calif.,
corporation that originally licensed the software; SCS Solars Inc.,
which signed a second licensing agreement, and five
individuals.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, the suit alleges, Solars
personnel supervised an attempted reload of TourTek with newly
repaired modules, but instead "the entire GATT computer system was
pulled down by this event, including the loss of all GATT product
information, reservations, pricing and credit card databases."
In addition to alleging that the defendants misrepresented
TourTek's capabilities, GATT charges that Orbit and Solars
conspired to conceal a joint venture relationship and true
ownership of the program.
SCS Solars Computing Systems Inc. (which said it's improperly
named in the suit) of Vancouver said in a statement that the
lawsuit is "frivolous, vexatious and completely without merit," and
pledged to mount a defense. Orbit could not be reached for
comment.
The suit alleges that TourTek was never able to handle GATT's
hundreds of daily reservation requests. At times, according to the
petition, TourTek could handle only one transaction at a time and
pay only one vendor per day.
According to the petition, GATT signed a series of licensing
agreements with Orbit Network Inc. beginning in June 1999 that
involved using TourTek on 75 travel agent workstations; a modified
software module to facilitate GATT's selling of room nights
obtained from hotels in exchange for advertising in its travel
publication, and an application to automatically fax a cancellation
notice to a room supplier if a confirmed reservation was
canceled.
According to the suit, with TourTek handling at best only small
parts of the reservation center's operation, Orbit revealed in
November it was a joint-venture partner with Solars, "which
actually owned the TourTek software."
In January, the petition alleges, GATT signed licensing and
support agreements with Solars, but the software ultimately could
not handle the center's volume or adequately handle vendor
payments, and "failed to provide reservation, rate, availability
and other data required of an operating reservation center."
After the Memorial Day weekend system crash, the suit says, GATT
reverted to its prior call center software.
"The contractual relationships with room and cruise suppliers
was damaged to the extent that several have canceled future
contracts because of the unavailability of payments under the
TourTek software," the suit claims.
The suit said the individuals named as defendants -- Michael
Casey, Richard "Dick" Neighbors, Andrew O'Leary, Robert Chisolm and
Frank Bush -- are officers and/or directors of Orbit and
Solars.
A Solars spokesman this week described the software as "fully
functioning" and said the company would soon comment further on the
suit.
GATT said the software issue will cause a delay in its
second-quarter earnings press release.
GATT vice president and chief financial officer Robert Roe
declined this week to elaborate on the suit's allegations, citing
the company's policy to avoid comment on pending litigation.