BEIJING, 27 May 2021: Leading Chinese online travel agency (OTA), Tongcheng-Elong and worldwide leader in travel retail, Travelport, today announced an agreement with Tongcheng-Elong to trial Travelport’s new modern, lightweight, highly functional microservices API, part of the recently launched Travelport+ next-generation platform.

The initiative would enable Tongcheng-Elong to access IATA New Distribution Capability (NDC) functionalities, including the NDC content from the multiple airlines Travelport has built NDC connections with. Combined with Tongcheng-Elong’s platform advantages, this in turn will enable Tongcheng-Elong to create more personalized experiences for its travelers, embedded across all its sales channels.

This pilot will build on Tongcheng-Elong’s existing integration of Travelport technology, which powers its bespoke shopping and booking engine. By adding NDC to the existing range of air content Travelport already provides, combined with the wealth of big data on its platform, Tongcheng-Elong will be able to up-level its merchandizing capabilities by providing travelers with personalized and dynamic offers designed to improve the traveler experience, while maximizing customer loyalty and boosting ancillary sales. All of this can be easily integrated into the different channels and devices Tongcheng-Elong’s customers use, including its mobile client and Wechat mini-program.

“NDC has huge innovation potential, which will be instrumental for us to match consumer expectations in today’s age of modern digital retailing,” said James Xu, Senior Vice President at Tongcheng-Elong and CEO of its airline ticket business group. “We’re confident that the wealth of big data on Tongcheng-Elong’s platform, combined with Travelport’s strong roster of NDC content and their new lightweight Travelport+ technology, will enable us to leverage NDC to its full potential.”

“The ability to personalize the traveler shopping experience is crucial for any modern digital travel retailer, and the cutting-edge NDC technology in Travelport+ is designed to do just that,” said Rob Brown, GVP and Managing Director, Global OTA at Travelport. “We’re certain the trust Tongcheng-Elong has shown in selecting Travelport as their GDS partner to develop NDC will pay ample dividends.”

Global Travel Management -in İngiltərənin ən yaxşı 50 TMC -yə səyahəti

“Absolutely, categorically, not.”

Not the answer we expected when we asked Scott Pawley, managing director of Global Travel Management (GTM), if he would recommend Travelport Smartpoint to another agency.

 “But only because I wouldn’t want to give up my competitive advantage” he quickly adds.

Strength from experience

GTM is a family.
It was founded in 1997 by husband and wife team, Scott and Natalie Pawley, along with Scott’s father, Frank. Based in Surrey, GTM is now one of the UK’s top 50 travel management companies with revenue of £20 million from corporate clients.

“The initial drive in setting up the business all those years ago was to make my parents proud,” says Scott, “and that’s still as important now as it was 23 years ago.”

Both Scott and Natalie had experience in travel management but wanted to plot their own course.

GTM’s ethos is to put great staff at the heart of everything they do.
“Employees of GTM have an average of 21 years’ experience in the industry and are used to managing clients’ travel needs through the most trying of circumstances,” says Scott.
So when the pandemic hit last year, GTM was ready to face it.

“We have become used to external influences impacting the business travel sector,” he says. “From the global credit crunch to 9/11and from the ash cloud crisis to the 2020 pandemic — we’re used to the business travel industry having to realign.”

From the smallest of small, to the bluest of blue

Most of GTM’s clients are UK-based, from small businesses to “the bluest of blue-chip companies” and come from a wide range of industry sectors, including brewing, medical, finance, oil and gas, and entertainment. 

GTM look to forge long-term, profitable, and mutually beneficial relationships with their clients, and while they have cultivated expertise with these industries, “we don’t specialize,” says Scott. 

“We have two questions before we take on a new client,” he says. “First, to ensure that we’re always doing a great job for every client, we ask ourselves, ‘can we provide a good, value–for–money service for this client?’ 

Second, because diversity is important to us, we ask another question. We want to ensure we’re working with clients who share many of our own aspirations on opportunity, so we ask, ‘does this client look like us?’”

23 years and counting

Scott says GTM has been working with Travelport since day one — he was already familiar with our GDS, “and there was no reason for me to make any other decision,” he says. “And it’s a decision I have been happy to stick with.”

We asked how GTM and the way they use technology has changed and evolved over the last 23 years.

“Initially, everything we did was completely hands-on,” says Scott. “But every year we look to develop our processes and technology so the business is more streamlined.  This has the effect of empowering our employees to use their skills and experience, instead of being hampered and hamstrung by poorly developed workflows.”

Cue Smartpoint

Scott told us that, before the pandemic, their most useful product was Hotel Retail because of its comprehensive set of hotel content — but since the start of the pandemic, they’ve found the COVID-19 Smartpoint Plugin “invaluable”, as well as Smartpoint Assisted Ticketing.

“Smartpoint is fast – which is critical,” says Scott. “It has a full range of functionality, which means that travel consultants can spend their time managing travel, instead of searching for functionality.  And it’s easy to work with – saving time and training resource.”

Using Smartpoint means GTM can closely follow every element of their workflow, making the most of each cross-sell and upsell opportunity — plus, “it’s extremely easy to set up and use remotely, saving IT resource time and cost,” says Scott. “Despite clients now having a significantly higher demand of information from each booking, every request can be met immediately, simply by using Smartpoint.”

The most important feature of Hotel Retail for GTM is the display of corporate rates, which gives their consultants the opportunity to explain the rate, demonstrate cost savings, and offer alternatives when and where possible.

“Having access to this content has given us the opportunity to increase attachment rates this year,” says Scott.

The changing world of corporate travel

“Travelport has been a crucial partner for GTM,” says Scott. “Our partnership is based on openness and trust.” 

Scott tells us that at the start of the pandemic, the numbers of GTM’s bookings diminished significantly and very rapidly — an experience many agencies can probably relate to. “But,” he adds,  “Travelport remained a reliable, trusted source of information throughout.” 

Scott believes the business travel sector has changed permanently in the last year,  and so GTM has had to change as well. Scott says that in addition to being a manager of travel, GTM has also become a trusted, authoritative source of business travel information.  

“We’re using a combination of our expert knowledge and the Travelport products to instil confidence in every client, every time they want help determining when, where, and whether to travel.”