Travelport last week began positioning itself for a time when major airlines will offer regularly scheduled flights between the U.S. and Cuba.
At present, the U.S. government allows only charter flights between the two countries, but Travelport's vice president of sales, Ron Cole, predicted that those barriers will come down eventually, adding that "we want to be at the front of the line when some of our partner airlines are ready to start flying directly [to Cuba] from the U.S."
On June 29, Travelport announced new GDS software that enables U.S.-based travel agencies to sell and book flights to and from Cuba for authorized travelers. The move came nearly half a year after the Obama administration relaxed regulations on travel to Cuba as part of a diplomatic thaw between the two longtime adversaries.
With the new software, agents can book airline itineraries that initiate in the U.S., then route through an intermediary country, such as Canada or Mexico, where regular commercial flights to Cuba are available. Agencies must first sign a contract amendment with Travelport agreeing to comply with U.S. regulations.
Cole characterized the software as a first step. Travelport, he said, will consider incorporating direct charter flights between the U.S. and Cuba if demand increases.
The new Cuba-flight software gives Travelport a jump on rivals Amadeus and Sabre. A day after the announcement, Amadeus released a statement saying that its travel agency clients in the U.S. will soon be able to book flights to and from Cuba as well, adding, "Amadeus will be communicating more details in the coming weeks."
Sabre did not respond to inquiries from Travel Weekly, but analyst Henry Harteveldt of Atmosphere Research Group said, "I suspect that Amadeus and Sabre both want to make sure there are no legal obstacles to their offering flights from the U.S. to Cuba, and of course that their airline clients make the inventory available for sale through these distribution channels."
Cole said neither regulatory nor technical challenges proved to be especially daunting. Flights between Cuba and countries other than the U.S. have long been in Travelport's network but had been blocked to comply with U.S. restrictions; Travelport tweaked its system to make those flights visible to its users at U.S. travel agencies.
The timing of Travelport's announcement last Monday proved serendipitous. On the same day, the Atlanta Journal- Constitution reported that Delta Air Lines could announce a resumption of charter flights between Atlanta and Havana as early as next spring. Tony Torres, Delta's general manager for sales in the Caribbean and Central America, told the newspaper that a formal announcement could come this fall. A day later, President Obama announced that the U.S. and Cuba had agreed to open embassies in each other's capital cities.
Among major U.S. airlines, JetBlue began offering charter flights between New York and Cuba this month and already operates charters between Cuba and Florida. American offers charters to Cuba from Miami.
Jacqueline Rosser, owner of the aviation regulation adviser Jacqueline Rosser Consulting, said that when major carriers operate such charters, FAA rules dictate that third parties, not the airlines, must schedule and sell the flights. Several airlines have expressed interest in offering regularly scheduled commercial flights to the island nation in the future.