EasyJet has today (5 November) signed an agreement with Amadeus and Galileo that will enable the corporate travel market to access the airline”s flights within preferred GDS environments.
The news is a major breakthrough and new technology will allow a European low-fares airline to offer its business passengers the facility for the first time.
Announcing the news at a press conference in London, easyJet chief executive, Andy Harrison, said: ”We have made huge improvements to what we offer our passengers and the timing is right to expand our distribution for business travellers with Galileo and Amadeus.”
The new technology will allow agencies to view and book easyJet flights as well as those of other carriers and plugs a business gap for corporates wishing to access easyJet”s burgeoning network.
And the carrier itself clearly hopes to raise its proportion of business travellers booking with easyJet from its current level of around 20% as Harrison told ABTN:
”We expect that the agreement will increase our new business by a few percentage points. Europe”s travel managers and their clients can book with easyJet, removing the last barrier to the corporate travel market.
”EasyJet will maintain its direct-sell business strategy, by adding a point-of-sale fee to ensure our website remains our primary distribution channel and fares will always be cheapest when booking direct online.”
Harrison was keen to point out how corporates could harness the power of the easyJet website, despite the fee of ”7.5 per single booking or ”5 for multiples. Claiming 12m unique visitors per month, Harrison maintained the website was the largest travel website in the UK ” ”it”s simply massive,” he said.
The chief executive was also at pains to emphasise that the new development was an ”additional distribution channel” and was ”not a fundamental rethink of our model.”
EasyJet has long-targeted the business traveller ” in contrast to many other low-cost operations, with its focus on flying into mainstream airports and providing relatively high frequency of service.
Expansion into primary airports such as Madrid and Milan Malpensa, was also complemented last week with easyJet”s announcement that it would acquire GB Airways, which would give it 29% of short-haul passengers at London Gatwick. The airline is also adding to French services at Charles de Gaulle, Orly and Lyon.
Harrison also outlined further details concerning the GB Airways takeover ” particularly addressing employment issues that some have raised.
”The company [GB Airways] has no sustainable future as it is at the moment,” he said, ”and British Airways has a list of priorities with T5, long-haul and transatlantic services, while Heathrow comes higher than Gatwick.
”EasyJet has offered a sustainable and prosperous future ” there will be some changes [however] as they unify.”