ECTAA files antitrust complaint against IATA
ECTAA – European Travel Agents’ and Tour Operators’ Association recently filed a complaint against the IATA before the European Commission.
Such complaint is based on the breach of Articles 101 and 102 of the EU Treaty, ECTAA alleged.
“Airlines have entered into direct competition with travel agents on the distribution of air tickets while the classical commission-based remuneration schemes have been abandoned”, ECTAA said.
The IATA PAP – Passenger Agency Programme is still entirely construed around a traditional “mandate scheme” (the so called “IATA PSAA – Passenger Sales Agency Agreement”), under which the remuneration of the travel agent is calculated on the ticket selling volume, where the percentage of such calculation is often close to the “zero percentage philosophy”: this is the negative sense of such programme and its assumed current inadequacy, ECTAA argued.
On the basis of the above said, ECTAA denounced the current policy applicable to air ticket distribution, which rules are unilaterally decided, “as a dominant system that restricts competition… (due to the) abuse of IATA’s dominant position” in such sector.
