Geneva - The International Air transport Association (IATA) today announced the launch of two services for airlines around the world to reduce costs and help manage risk associated with credit card operations.
- The IATA CreditCard Optimisation Service will reduce commission rates and service charges, improve speed and method of payment and create a single point of contract for all credit card negotiations. The negotiations will be based on complete audit of all credit card contracts of a participating airline and the results will be benchmarked against a proprietary database to identify gaps. New agreements will then be negotiated with banks to bring greater savings. This unique service is offered in cooperation with CreditCard Optimisation Ltd, back and front office cost reduction subject matter experts, who have achieved significant savings for the airline industry for the past 15 years.
- The second service called IATA Perseuss is an online database, which allows airlines to legally share data about fraudulent credit card transactions. Payment card fraud is estimated to cost the airline industry close to US$1.4 billion annually. Identifying fraudulent transactions is critical to driving down costs. Working in partnership with application developer, about:blank, this secure platform allows the airline community to upload and share fraud data in an environment that is flexible, clear and scalable. Currently, some 40 airlines are using the service and already contributed over 800,000 data elements.
The projected losses of the airline industry for 2008/09 are estimated at US$27.8 billion and IATA is committed on assisting airlines with solutions that will bring cost reductions while increasing efficiencies.
Notes for Editors:
- IATA (International Air Transport Association) represents some 230 airlines comprising 93% of scheduled international air traffic.
For more information, please contact:
Corporate Communications
Tel: +41 22 770 2967
Email: corpcomms@iata.org