Bloomberg News Service
GENEVA — The International Air Transport Association, a worldwide airline organization, and information technology company Sita Group said they intend to start an issuing system for electronic tickets for international flights by mid-2001 now that they’ve resolved data-security questions.
IATA hopes that as many as 35 airlines will sign up for the electronic-ticketing system by the end of March and intends to begin operating it by mid-2001. IATA is managing the system while Sita developed the technology.
Electronic ticketing, allowing passengers to travel without a paper ticket, has been used for domestic flights in various countries for as long as eight years. Carriers until now have been reluctant to issue e-tickets for international flights because information-security systems differed between countries.
"Airlines simply can’t have access to other airlines’ ticketing systems," Michael Feldman, director of passenger services at IATA, said in an interview.
"There needs to be a barrier restricting what information they can see. This has proved very difficult before now."
Airlines that join the IATA system will sign a multilateral agreement authorizing access to a common database of neutral information. IATA will monitor each entry made on the system.
"This system is a way for existing airline booking systems to communicate with each other," said Feldman.
Passengers using electronic ticketing present identification at the check-in desk or insert a credit card into a machine to begin their trip.
While they still receive boarding passes and baggage-check coupons, they don’t need a paper ticket even if they change planes.
Producing, providing and tracking a paper ticket throughout a passenger’s journey costs about $10.
Electronic ticketing can reduce that cost by as much as 80 percent, IATA said.
Sita, which is owned by airlines and other air transport organizations, expects e-tickets to account for as much as 50 percent of worldwide airline tickets by 2005.
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