Latest News
HomeAssociationsECTAA 85th bi-annual meeting in Bucharest, 23-24 May 2002

ECTAA 85th bi-annual meeting in Bucharest, 23-24 May 2002

Besides the EU affairs, the new IATA Passenger Sales Agency Agreement and various other air transport matters were the core issues at the…

Besides the EU affairs, the new IATA Passenger Sales Agency Agreement and various other air transport matters were the core issues at the 85th bi-annual meeting of ECTAA<.> organised for the first time by the Romanian Member association, ANAT, in Bucharest on the 23-24 May 2002. On that occasion the Member associations of ECTAA assessed the current situation of the trade following the economic recession, which was accelerated by the dramatic events of 11 September, and reviewed a number of legal, fiscal, consumer and competition issues of major importance for the trade.



Over the last two years ECTAA has been involved in the negotiations with IATA on a new Passenger Sales Agency Agreement, which governs the relations between travel agents and airlines. Since the very beginning, ECTAA pursued a more balanced and business-oriented agreement, by which travel agents would be entitled to a fair remuneration for the services they provide to the client on behalf of the airlines. The negotiations are now coming to an end and the next IATA Passenger Conference, which is scheduled on 25-28 June 2002 in Miami, will possibly approve the outcome of the negotiations. The Passenger Conference’s decisions will be submitted to the EU Competition Directorate and ECTAA will be closely involved in that process.



Other air matters have also been reviewed, such as the progress made with respect to the establishment of a Passenger Protection Plan, whereby passengers will be protected against an airline’s or travel agent’s financial default. The plan will be implemented in a number of countries (regrettably only in 7 European Union Member States) and may be operational as soon as 2004. The new piece of legislation on denied boarding, which extends the current Community legislation on compensation in case of denied boarding to cancellations and long delays and which will cover charter flights operated by tour operators, continues to be of major concern to ECTAA Members, who insist that the package travel customers are already adequately protected by the Package Travel Directive. ECTAA Members also discussed the mal-practice of a large number of airlines, which continue to include security and airport taxes in the taxes/fees/charges box of the air ticket to evade commission payments to travel agents. It was noted that the European Commissioner for Transport shares ECTAA’s view that the airlines’ practice is misleading to the consumer, as security and airport taxes are not considered to be government taxes and should be part of the fare paid by the customer for the service rendered by the airlines. ECTAA will continue to follow this issue.



With respect to the general trends and developments of the trade, a tour de table showed that the business is steadily recovering but pre-11 September bookings have not yet been reached with a few exceptions in some countries. Most countries record bookings similar to the levels reached in the year 2000. Business travel is still lagging behind while leisure travel is going well. Last minute bookings are very usual. Most countries recorded a good skiing season though summer reservations have been slow to start. Coach and cruise tourism is still very popular.



With respect to competition issues, ECTAA continues to watch carefully the developments in relation to the operations of OPODO. While this joint venture of nine major European airlines, who are dominant on their respective national markets, has not yet been given the green light by the European competition authorities, the online distribution portal has started operations in Germany, United Kingdom and France. ECTAA Members are carefully monitoring the operations in order to ensure that travel agents have access to the same fares and stock of tickets made available by the shareholder airlines to Opodo. ECTAA is in regular contacts with the Competition Directorate of the European Commission, who has yet to authorise the joint venture.



ECTAA Members continue to be very attentive to the developments of the legislative proposal modifying the current travel agents’ VAT scheme. The modifications proposed by the Commission Directive proposal has been welcomed by the trade but the Member States’ representatives have expressed some concerns with respect to the practical implementation of this proposal. It seems that the Spanish Council Presidency is working on a modified text, which would be less favourable to the trade. ECTAA will continue to follow the developments very closely.



As regards consumer affairs, ECTAA Members were informed about the Commission’s new Consumer Policy Strategy 2002-2006, which includes the revision of the Package Travel Directive 90/314/EEC some time in 2003. This will be of major importance to ECTAA Members, as it is the most important legislation governing the package travel trade.



During the two-day meeting, the ECTAA Members elected their new President for 2002-2004, Mr Walter Krombach from Germany, who brings with him invaluable knowledge and extensive experience form the travel trade. The outgoing Swedish President, Mr Carl Axel Rheborg, has been elected Vice-President and will continue to actively participate in the air matters of ECTAA, as he will be one of three Members representing the travel agents at the upcoming IATA Passenger Conference in June. Mr Antonio Scipioni (Italy) was also elected Vice President and Mr Francisco Calheiros (Portugal) was elected Treasurer for the same period 2002-2004.



The next bi-annual meeting of ECTAA will take place in Vienna from 21-22 November 2002.

Co-Founder & Managing Director - Travel Media Applications | Website | + Posts

Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.

29/03/2024
28/03/2024
27/03/2024
26/03/2024
25/03/2024
22/03/2024