WASHINGTON -- A new document is providing stark examples of the
apparent rift between the Transportation Department and Office of
Management and Budget over the future of the GDS rules, including
whether they should be kept at all.
The disclosure comes in connection with an expected, and
seemingly innocuous, proposed sixth extension to continue the
existing rules until the DOT can decide whether to keep them and,
if so, how to change them.
The proposed extension would let the DOT keep the existing rules
in place until Jan. 31.
In addition to publishing the proposed extension notice in the
Federal Register, however, the DOT placed in its docket a document
showing the changes the OMB made in the DOT draft of the
notice.
The changes are marked in red, highlighting some significant
differences in the DOT and OMB views of the rulemaking.
The DOT's draft, for example, said the following:
"We have tentatively concluded that most of the current rules
should be maintained because they appear to be necessary for
promoting airline competition and helping to ensure that consumers
and their travel agents can obtain complete and accurate
information on airline services."
With the OMB's changes, it now reads like this:
"We have tentatively concluded that most of the current rules
should be maintained on a temporary basis because they may be
necessary for promoting airline competition and protecting
consumers, although the department may determine in its
reexamination that the need for most or all of the rules has
ended."
Throughout the document, anywhere the DOT writes about an
"apparent need" to maintain the rules or similar phrasing, the
wording is changed to "may need" or similar phrasing.
The OMB also deleted several lengthy passages that recounted the
rules' supposed benefits for small agencies and airlines.
It also deleted several pages of background information on the
GDS business and the government's regulation of it.
Jon Ash, managing director of consulting firm Global Aviation
Associates in Washington, said the OMB seems to be telling the DOT
to "stop trying to justify regulating," especially in a
straightforward notice that doesn't need to rehash the
arguments.
"You could really see a disconnect between a methodical, slow
regulatory process [at the DOT] on the one hand and an inclination
[at the OMB] to let the market work and require that the agency get
on and do that," Ash said.
"Clearly, [the OMB] continues to sit on the DOT and try to move
them in a direction of (a) speed, and (b) less intervention in the
marketplace," he added.
The disagreement over the speed of the process also shows up in
the length of the extension. The document shows the DOT, as it has
in the past, wanted to extend the rules for as long as a year,
until next March 31.
The OMB deleted that date and inserted Jan. 31.
Get More!
To read -- in Adobe .pdf format -- the changes the OMB made in the
DOT draft of the notice, click here, www.twcrossroads.com/resources/gdsextension.pdf.
(Note: This file requires Adobe Acrobat Reader. Click here to visit Adobe's Web site and download the
latest version.)