Fact Sheet: Flex Fares

• A large proportion of trips require the services of two or more airlines in order for the passenger to complete a single journey 
• The interline system is the global network of international air transport services linking most cities with scheduled air services
• It provides a travel option that enables:
• Fully flexible fares
• Allows last minute changes/routings on other airlines 
• Provides a single ticket (fare) for a journey using two or more carriers
• Provides for baggage transfer at connecting points
• Common fares and rules for multilateral interlining are required for such a common system and have been in place for over 50 years 
• Governments have understood the benefits of the interline system and provided immunity from competition laws
• However, immunities have been scaled back. The block exemption for tariff agreements:
• Within EU ended at the end of 2006
• Between EU-USA and between EU-Australia ended at the end of June 2007
• Between EU and the rest of the world ended at the end of October 2007
• The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) ended immunity in June 2008 for markets to/from Australia
• IATA has developed a mechanism to address competition concerns while maintaining the benefits of interlining for consumers

IATA Flex Fares

• Face-to-face airline meetings have been replaced by an e-Tariffs online voting platform
• Flex Fares are produced by a mechanism that automatically calculates interlineable fares based on average carrier fares in affected markets 
• An interlining premium is added to account for the added flexibility of these interline fares 
• Flex Fares have been adopted and used for all of the IATA routes worldwide except where government approvals are pending

Updated: June 2013