Major Indian and global airlines are witnessing a high number of flight booking cancellations to many cities of China amid the deadly coronavirus outbreak. IndiGo Cathay Pacific and British Airways have suspended flights to the mainland China. In addition,  Air India, Singapore Airlines, SpiceJet, IndiGo, AirAsia, Shandong Airlines, Air China, Cathay Pacific and China Eastern have waived off charges for any cancellation or flight change. Indigo has suspended flights on Delhi-Chengdu route and the Bengaluru- Hong Kong flight effective February 1 till February 20, while Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific is reducing the capacity of its flights to and from mainland China by 50 per cent or more, from January 30 to the end of March 2020. Air India has announced that Reissue/ No-Show/Cancellation and Refund charges for all international tickets for travel to/from China till February 24 is waived off. Air Asia and Cathay Dragon have also extended suspension of flights to and from Wuhan and allowed credit account/refund for other mainland China bookings. Air India and Indigo have enabled the waiver of ticket change and cancellation fee on the bookings within the next one month. Shandong Airlines is also providing waiver on full refund of tickets issued for travel to/from China. Whereas, Rebooking, rerouting and refund charges on Cathay Pacific/Cathay Dragon will be waived off for all tickets issued worldwide for confirmed bookings arriving to or departing from mainland China between January 28 and March 31. IndiGo currently runs two daily direct flights to China, one is on Delhi-Chengdu route and another is on Kolkata-Guangzhou route. It will start a daily flight on Mumbai-Chengdu route from 15 March. Air India has only one direct flight to China and it …

Sabre Corporation and Accor have announced that they intend to create the first unified central reservation (CR) and property management (PM) platform for the global hospitality industry. In collaboration with Accor, Sabre intends to develop a new full service property management capability and enrich its existing central reservation and limited service property management systems. These capabilities will combine within a new unified cloud-native, highly-flexible platform that will be built for and available to hoteliers across all property classes and geographic regions. In this context, Accor would be Sabre’s newest enterprise hospitality customer, adopting Sabre’s industry-leading SynXis Central Reservation system and, ultimately, the new global technology platform for all of its hospitality brands and geographies. “We are thrilled to be collaborating with Accor and look forward to redefining the guest experience together. We know our customers have historically had limited options in this area, and we are taking the lead to deliver the solutions that hoteliers have repeatedly told us they both want and need,” said Sean Menke, president and CEO of Sabre Corporation. “Once developed, this offering will power a new generation of retailing, distribution and fulfillment solutions that will enable hotels to drive revenue growth beyond traditional sources and offer unique personalized services to their guests around the world.” With a diverse portfolio of brands from luxury to economy and over 50 years of experience in the industry, Accor offers a unique perspective on what guests want and hotels need. “Sabre shares our vision of a future where hoteliers are able to offer guests an unforgettable, personalized experience that goes beyond simply being a place or service,” said Sébastien Bazin, Chairman and CEO for Accor. “Partners like Sabre are …

The Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru is investing Rs 13,000 crore for infrastructure expansion, including the South Runway, which is operational, and the first phase of Terminal 2, said Hari Marar, MD & CEO, Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL). The investment is being made to support its growth. The airport welcomed 33.65 million passengers in 2019, registering 4.1 per cent growth in passenger traffic compared to 2018. To support this growth, the airport He also estimated that passenger volumes at the airport will be between 55 to 65 million passengers per annum (mppa) in the next five years. Currently, Bengaluru is connected to 82 destinations, including 25 international cities. Thirty-six passenger airlines (eight domestic and 24 international, including four Indian carriers) operate to and from BLR Airport on a regular basis.

The Sun Temple at Konark, Odisha will soon be included in the list of iconic tourist sites, said the Union Tourism Minister, Prahlad Singh Patel. Last year, the government announced in budget to develop 17 tourism sites across the country under the Iconic Tourist Sites Development Project with a budget of Rs 5000 crore. Leaders and stakeholders from Odisha have since then demanding to include the Sun Temple of Konark in the list. No other destination from the state was included in the list. “The people of Odisha will soon receive the good news about Konark being included in the list of iconic sites. We will organise a special event to announce the inclusion very soon,” said the Minister while addressing at the concluding ceremony of two-day long National Tourism Conference at Konark. He also visited the Sun temple and reviewed the necessary preservation plans with the Archaeological Survey of India officials. Last year, there was a huge hue and cry about Konark not making it to the list announced by the Ministry of Tourism. Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan had requested the Union Tourism Minister to include at least two tourist places of importance from the state in the list of iconic tourist sites to be developed by the Centre.

In order to handle the increase in passenger traffic on the Tel Aviv-New Delhi sector, Air India has announced that they are doubling the frequency on the route to six flights per week from April. Air India started with three flights a week to Tel-Aviv in 2018 and would make this to six flights-a-week from April 1 this year. The announcement was made by Indian Ambassador in Israel Sanjeev Singla during the Republic Day celebrations at the Indian Embassy in Delhi recently. “Direct Air India flight connectivity between New Delhi and Tel Aviv is a game-changer in our bilateral relations reflecting the importance we attach to people-to-people linkages and connectivity. The direct flights have greatly enhanced movement of people between the two countries resulting in an increase in tourism and also facilitating the travel of the business community.” Every flight from Tel Aviv has almost 50 per cent of passengers travelling beyond Delhi to domestic destinations within India and international destinations including Singapore, Thailand, Australia, Shanghai, Hongkong, Sri Lanka and Nepal, a press release issued by Air India said.

MITT will launch new travel technology sector in 2020. The new sector will be a key hub for travel and booking software providers looking to expand their reach into the valuable Russian market. With 4,000 visitors interested in travel technologies at last year’s show, the Travel Technology sector will be a key interest for visitors, helping to attract a highly targeted audience of travel agents and other industry professionals. With its move to Crocus Expo in 2020, MITT will offer even more space for business and networking. The expansion consolidates MITT’s position as an unmissable industry hub, bringing professionals together to network, do business, and discuss the most prevalent issues facing the travel industry.

Thailand is looking at attracting Indian weddings to its smaller cities, revealed Chattan Kunjara Na Ayudhya, Deputy Governor for International Marketing (Asia and South Pacific), Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT). Talking about Indian weddings in Thailand, he said, “Thailand is the number one outbound wedding destination for Indians. Now we have realised that Indian weddings are not restricted only to big cities, but weddings of about 200 people, are now going beyond popular destinations. Phuket and hua Hin are very popular now. There are other smaller provinces also that benefit because some of them have magnificent scenery and unspoilt nature, which the wedding planners look for. In 2019, Thailand received 1.9 million Indian arrivals, which set a new record, claiming that they have new offerings to attract tourists from secondary cities of India.

Forwardkeys analysis of international departure data has shown that International outbound departures are down 18.5% from India in the period 13th Jan – 25th January vis-à-vis the same period last year. Around Jan 13th the virus outbreak issue started spreading and departures to SE Asia and Hong Kong are most impacted. The 18.5% decline is in comparison to the month of December 2019 where International departures from India saw a 2.5% decline.

Onefinerate.com gives its travel agent partners and M!CE bookers easy and direct access to hotels that match their event criteria. RFP is sent instantly to the selected hotels for them, with a prompt, to respond to the booker at the earliest. The OFR operations team ensures that the RFPs are responded by the hotel partners at the earliest. This leads to a shorter ‘selling cycle’ thereby helping both parties to close deals in a shorter window of time. Incremental sales & revenue for hotels with minimal use of their resources adds to their bottom line and at the same time giving the bookers an opportunity secure business faster. Onefinerate.com or OFR is one-of-its-kind travel marketplace designed for both B2C and B2B business. It addresses the key pain points of both the M!CE bookers & hotels like lead generation, access & faster response times. With deep domain knowledge, the OFR team has developed complex algorithms that identify & match the bookers requirements with the availability & rates offered by hotels. With the expanded distribution network, Hotels discover Bookers that they had never worked with and Bookers begin business with Hotels where they had no relationships.

The event was inaugurated by Special Secretary & Financial Adviser of Ministry of Tourism, R K Chaturvedi. Director General (Tourism). Meenakshi Sharma, Addl. Director General (Tourism), Rupinder Brar and other senior officials of the Ministry of Tourism were also present during the inauguration. The theme of the event is ‘Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat’ and ‘Celebrating 150 Years of Mahatma Gandhi’. The Ministry of Tourism (MOT) has organised Bharat Parv from January 26-31, 2020. Now, an annual affair, the ‘Parv’ will showcase the cuisine and culture of different states of India. Earlier Rupinder Brar, Additional Director General (ADG), Tourism, had said, “We are extremely excited about the upcoming Bharat Parv. The event gets a lot of footfall and attraction from people across the country. We are looking forward to an exuberant response this year, just like the previous ones and we are prepared to showcase the food, arts, culture and also the tableaus that will come from the Republic Day parade.”