We are often too engrossed in running our day to day business to take note of changes (or proposed changes) that can have a dramatic impact on our overall business.
It's one of the reasons that I joined SPAA - please let me elaborate.....
I was down in London at the ABTA Aviation Committee meeting last week, when we started to discuss a couple of items on the Agenda. The CAA are currently having a four week consultation period where they have outlined proposed changes to the ATOL scheme to bring it into line with the new EU Package Travel Directive which is due to be in place July 2018.
As we discussed the new proposals, something struck me - one of the biggest proposed changes is the treatment of 'Flight Plus'. Under the new proposals 'Flight Plus' will be more or less redundant - with all transactions which are currently 'Flight Plus' being treated as a package. Now that might not seem like a big change, but in terms of company liability, bonding and finance, this change could be huge for anyone currently conducting business in the 'Flight Plus' category.
Now July 2018 might seem a long way off, but systems have to be changed and different bonding arrangements will need to be in place etc. These things are generally not executed very quickly - especially if you don't become aware of them until the last minute. So what should you do if you are going to be affected by these proposed changes? I would say, read the consultation and reply to it in your best terms about how it will affect you. SPAA will be compiling a response, we would also like your feedback, but I think it is imperative that you should also respond in person if you are an ATOL holder. CAA will only take note of any objections if there is sufficient weight behind it - and that means that we will need as many responses as possible to get our point across.
Another item on the Agenda was a proposal for IATA Remittance Holding Capacity - IATA were proposing to cap 'unauthorised' growth of Agents BSP at 15%. What does that mean for any IATA agent? Well, for instance, if you were ticketing a group and exceeded that 15% level - you wouldn't be able to run the tickets until you had contacted IATA and gained some form of authorisation (or supplied payment up front) from/to IATA. That really isn't practical and I'm glad to say that ABTA and other members of an Agents working group got their point across and managed to persuade IATA (and the airlines) to pilot test a less draconian counter proposal before making any decision on capping ticketing capacity of Agents.
The point I am trying to make here is that it is very easy to be engrossed in your business whilst some of these quite major changes just 'creep in' whilst nobody is looking. I know that these particular changes don't affect every leisure agent - but if you have an ATOL or your parent company has an ATOL or issues tickets via IATA BSP, then these changes could have a serious impact on your business.
SPAA and ABTA act as the watchdogs for the Travel Business - looking out for forthcoming pitfalls and changes and alerting Agents to them. They also make submissions on behalf of the Travel Trade in response to these consultations. But ultimately we as Travel Agents, need to take heed, stand up for ourselves and make our own voices and opinions heard. Otherwise things might just pass you by.........
From the President
