Airport Passenger Solutions

Case Study - Travel & Mobility

About the Client

This case study talks about how PAYOTEK Digital’s payment advisory solution helped a prominent Airport Management Company in India keep track of various passenger onboarding statistics and ensure no revenue loss due to inaccurate data.

Challenges

The following are some of the challenges faced by the client that warranted a strategic solution.

  • Passenger on-board statistics provided by airline carriers were not accurate.
  • Loss of PFC (Passenger Facility Charge) revenue due to inaccurate reporting by the airline carriers
  • AERA not supportive of a transparent passenger data-sharing model
  • AAI not interested in the missing non-aeronautical revenue
  • Passenger data supplied by airlines to airports at two different intervals was inconsistent.
  • Difficult to determine if airlines are not providing accurate passenger numbers on board their flights
  • Safety & operating concerns due to non-reliable data
  • Airlines do not want airports to charge all the PFC to their passengers.

Earlier Solutions

Considering the gravity of the situation, the client tried various solutions and possibilities. Some of the ways that the client tried to address the situation were:

  • Working with IATA who regulates mainly airlines BSP. However, they were unwilling to accommodate airports as an additional member to share airline addendum data, including the passenger details.
  • Accelya was willing to help provide solutions to DIAL. But this was in a very preliminary stage & legal obligations hindered signing MOU or even an NDA between the relevant parties.
  • Pilot trial to collect the fee directly from the passenger at Hyderabad International airport was futile. Collection of PFC directly from passengers did not prove to be a practical solution.
  • Speaking to the government authorities & airport regulators to introduce a fair policy to share passenger details between airlines & airports. But this seemed like a distant opportunity.

The PAYOTEK Digital Proposal

As a renowned payment advisory company with well-rounded expertise in travel and mobility solutions, PAYOTEK Digital came out with a multi-thronged proposal with a modernized solution to address the client’s challenges.

  • Airport Passenger Integration solutions
    PAYOTEK Digital understands that many possibilities exist today to collect accurate passenger data at airports. Based on our experience and expertise in this area, we recommended the below approach to integrate several third-party solutions to help with passenger data accuracy.. We suggested that each of these recommendations is to be explored & evaluated separately or even jointly.

    • SITA AirportConnect open (API integration for check-in counters)
    • Res2’s iPort DCS customer services platform (looks like Airport Consortium is already using iPort DCS core services platform)
    • SITA BI analytics (AirportPulse)
    • Veovo’s passenger predictability solution
    • Airport Consortium’s own WIFI & Beacon solution to capture passenger data
    • Building a customized airport app (third party vendor) with a reward program for passengers
  • Online Payment Processing Solutions (technical)
    • The below cost-effective solution only works if the PGs are ready to invest in it without additional cost to the Airport Consortium except for the transaction processing fees. Since most ticketing experiences happen during the purchase from a travel agency, a tourist operator, online travel booking websites, travel aggregators, airline web bookings, etc., airline carriers should agree to the revenue split.
    • Based on the preliminary data we collected concerning the usual trends in terms of booking experience (mostly online e-commerce), below were our suggestions,
    • Payment gateway integration (All PG’s/wallet providers/banks e.g. Razorpay, PayTm, GooglePay, Bill desk, CC Avenue, etc. should accept to allow the revenue split happening at the end of the user journey through the payment page)
    • Extend passenger payment checkout experience – revenue sharing using split & transfer payments, which is already widely supported by PGs today

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