Some fine tapas and even finer bottles of Spanish red made for an interesting chin wag with the new(ish) head of Amadeus in the UK earlier this week.
Tim Russell was the host with the most as a handful of wise travel tech hacks (plus a newcomer - me) met for a post new year, new year soiree at a Spanish restaurant in central London.
Coincidentally hours earlier Amadeus had announced a board restructuring which will see chief exec David Jones leave in 12 months, probably having seen through a much anticipated IPO.
A philosophical, and very upbeat, Russell was sure he will leave Amadeus in safe hands because the firm has so many talented people coming through the ranks - the next generation.
Amadeus, he told us, is always looking to innovate and find new ways to add value to its commercial partners' businesses - you know the game's up the moment you're asked what's coming up next and you have no answer.
There are those in the industry who would argue with his assertion that there is a growing acceptance that GDSs have a 'symbiotic' relationship with the partner airlines they offer distribution to.
Apparently Amadeus has a presence in more countries than Coca Cola, a seemingly astonishing fact if, like me, you've travelled to some pretty far flung places and yet still managed to get your fix of the fizzy brown stuff.
Figures point to a decreasing proportion of airline business coming through the GDSs, although received wisdom suggests the latest round of contract negotiations with the likes of BA proved to me much less fraught - the UK flag carrier is not in a position to be quite as bullish as in previous negotiations.
It might be true that the likes of BA can distribute in a market like the UK just as efficiently itself, but it relies on GDSs for its vital global reach, so it can do business in exotic markets from Bangalore to Burkina Faso to Buenos Aires.
Russell is confident even an airline as aggressively opposed to third party distribution as Ryanair will come round eventually to realise the added value GDSs can offer.
Is Russell right when he says a system built by one company for 50 airlines to distribute through is always going to be better than a system built by one company to distribute just one company's inventory?
If he is that raises the question of scale and whether the three main global GDS players have a Tesco-like grip on the market.
Certainly they do not seem overly concerned with new entrants and would-be challengers to their crown, their size meaning they can cope with the eye-watering complexity of keeping the world on the move.
All of which led the conversation to another sector in which there's also a three-way battle for dominance (and at this point it's only fair to credit a certain former Travolution editor with this particular line of questioning).
Amadeus, Travelport (Galileo/Worldspan), Sabre. Which is the Apple, which the Microsoft and which the Google of the GDS world, and which one does Russell say Amadeus is most like?
There came a typical politician's answer: all three.
Initially it was more Google, as a late entrant on the scene. Then it went into an Apple phase with the focus on design. And latterly it has been demonstrating more ''Microsoftic' tendencies due to its leading presence in some markets.
If you're into these sort of comparisons this week PhoCusWright produced a first major piece of research on the three leading GDSs, so do read our report by Travolution's Martin Cowan on its findings.
Lee Hayhurst
The GDSs as a middle man has certainly made a good profit out of agents over the past 20 years - systems we cant do without but obviously they charge both airlines/principals and agents. Its all very secret as to exactly what they charge airlines for and I suspect they have different rankings - i.e. I was told by one GDS's help desk when I could not get a ticket number through to an airline which kept cancelling a ticketed booking, that 1) the airline did not participate in the "ticket notification system" despite being a "direct connect" customer and 2) I should ring the airline to put it in! i.e. a call from Australia to Africa as advised by a centre in South America! What rubbish -
and at what cost?? If you can sell a seat on an GDS's airline surely you should be able to advise the ticket number in the same booking. What about the infant ticket scenario - I am not sure whether it is the GDS or the airline at fault - but in Australia you cannot e-ticket an infant apparently because infants were not included in the original design of e-ticketing. One airline cancelled one of two infants in my agent booking during a trick ticketing process and the clients ended up at an airport with a ticket for an infant but the infant was not on the booking - plus they had different surnames -what a nightmare. How can an airline cancel someone out of an agent booking - where have the standards gone??? Who sorted out the mess by negoitating with 2 airlines over 2 days - me the agent, and the airline booking still did not include the second infant even though I had been assured it did. Who's abilities were undermined by the scenario as far as the passenger was concerned - me the agent as "I must have done something wrong!. Yet the airlines are thinking about charging agents for access to their seats - the commission we currently receive, if any, does not even cover office costs for making the booking in the first place, never mind maintaining the booking, rebooking due to schedule changes, etc. I believe agents should be charging airlines once a ticket has been issued, for scedule changes (costs of notification to clients, reprinting itineraries etc. etc.) and not to mention the endless reissue of tickets. They say its agents serving their clients -really it is service we are doing for the airline at no cost - imagine if they had to notify every pax with every schedule change and get every ticket reissued, how much would it cost them? Would they charge the pax???
as they suggest agents should.
What is UFTAA doing to support agents in fending off the lowering of commission and hikes in costs (and now this suggestion that agents should pay airlines for seats)? The airlines are trying to cut out the middleman is always the reply but surely the GDSs are also middlemen and they dont seem to be under attack. In fact we now have two middlemen - agents and GDSs and the latter do not seem to be suffering.
Have the GDSs too much self-interest to guard, look at their origins, i.e. commerical ties - Airlines. Why are agents world-wide not acting in unison to halt our own demise.
After all, was not the collapse of the global economy enough to convince everyone that it is time to stop thinking that the "big boys" and marketing gurus of the industry are playing by the same rules, using the same ethics that have been an integral part of business and as we are expected to use with clients.
All that has gone out of the window in the higher echelons of not only banking, but commerical industries throughout the world.
We have a global economy and yet I cannot earn any commission for a business class seat I sell from Germany to South Africa? Who decided that - some marketing department again trying to justify their existence no doubt.
The travel industry is in a total mess - not because of the internet but because marketing and executives are busy trying to justify their pays, keep their subsidiaries happy. Is this really good business? Look at what happened to the banks and other internationals. Where are the travel industry's leaders and what are they doing???!!!