As of 1st June 2008, the Airline industry embarks on new Simplified Business process by issuing only Electronic Tickets and thus saving tons of paper and trees for the environment. While acceptance of paper tickets issued prior to 1 June 2008 will still be honored until expiry, all Airlines along with Travel Agents will only issue electronic tickets.
During a ceremony held at Oman Air Head Office, all staffs that have made this project success for Oman Air were awarded. In a statement, H.E. Darwish Bin Ismail Al Balushi, Secretary-general of the Ministry of Finance and member of the board of directors of Oman Air, whom is running the Chief Executive Officer’s duties, praised all staff that were involved and was proud to see that Oman Air being among the first carriers in the world to adopt this new process. He went on to say that the airline had been the leader in the region on developing and implementing e-ticket products, moreover that despite complications faced by Airlines, in January 2008 Oman Air complied with e-ticketing deadline accomplishing 100% online Electronic ticketing, 5 months ahead of the IATA target date of 31 May 2008.
Hamed Bin Saif Al Harthy, Senior Manager Reservations and Global Distribution said that e-ticketing is one of the most significant opportunities to reduce costs and improve passenger convenience, and Oman Air continues to lead the way in this regard. This distinguished achievements with relation to employing e- ticketing he added, is to ensure our main objective that is, to make travel a real enjoyable experience for our valuable passengers, by commencing the most advanced systems and applications to facilitate travel for our customers, enabling more travellers to enjoy the benefits of e-tickets when flying with the national carrier of Sultanate. Now Oman Air provide its costumers greater convenience, reduced processing time, simplified operations and faster check-in. he further said that as of today, the Airline can exchange electronic coupons with 35 major Airlines in the world and as well as all Travel Agents can issue Oman Air Electronic Tickets thru the distribution systems used by them.
Corporate Communications and Media of Oman Air informed that Electronic ticketing is replacing how airlines conduct business globally. IATA, an organization that governs all airlines they said, has mandated a June 1, 2008 deadline for all billing and settlement plan and industry settlement plan to eliminate paper tickets. They developed the commercial standards of today’s aviation industry and requires that its 240-member airlines transition into issuing electronic tickets by December 2007, but extended the deadline to May 31, 2008. Corporate Communications and Media of Oman Air concluded notifying that Oman Air has inaugurated the implementation of e-ticketing as from 26 September 2005, whereby it was not only one of a few carriers who first launched electronic ticketing, but were also one of very few to have reached 100% online months ahead of IATA target date.
