Airlines ticketing agents protested against foreign and domestic airlines in the State capital on Tuesday demanding increase in commission.
Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI) National Executive Member Sunil Notani said that foreign airlines had earlier decreased the commission of travel agents from nine per cent to one per cent and now they are going to eliminate it altogether. Thousands of travel agents are finding it hard to make the ends meet and now with this decision of airlines business of agents will shut down completely.
He further said that as per the rule number 137 of International Air Transport Association (IATA), the international body for monitoring travel agents, agents should be paid their deserved remuneration. In other countries like Australia, Japan and Srilanka agents are paid their remuneration. Notani said that earlier in 2008 agents from all over the country stopped booking tickets for Jet Airways and Singapore Airlines as they refused paying commission. Agents on protested outside Raja Bhoj airport in here and at other airports against the move of airlines. Notani further said that Supreme Court (SC) has banned agents from charging transaction fees which ranged between Rs 350 to Rs 10000. This decision of the SC has affected the income of agents badly. Offline agents still count for over 70 per cent domestic ticketing and 80 per cent international ticketing but their commission is far less than ticketing websites.
He said that the main demands of the agents are to increase their commission from present one per cent to five per cent, inclusion of service and other taxes in the commission, time period for payment to the airlines to be increased from weekly to fortnightly.