GUILD BACKS SCHEME TO REPLACE “OUT-DATED” BSP

The UK's Guild of Business Travel Agents is backing moves towards setting up a giant pan-European “clearing house” to replace the travel industry's outdated payments system.

“Travel agents, who buy thousands of different travel components from thousands of different suppliers every week, have to use a central clearing system - otherwise making payments and chasing invoices would be a logistical impossibility,” says GBTA chief executive Philip Carlisle.

The present Bank Settlement Plan (BSP) system, created and administered by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), is however now widely seen as out-of-date.

The Guild of European Business Travel Agents (GEBTA) – of which the UK's GBTA is a leading member – and the leisure-orientated European Community Travel Agents' Association (ECTAA) GEBTA and ECTAA have been canvassing industry opinion for the past six months, and have now commissioned a feasibility study into a replacement system.  The study is expected to be completed by end-November this year. Possible providers of an alternative to BSP could be technology or credit card companies and the new system would be internet-based.

“The old BSP has served us well,” says Carlisle, “but it simply wasn't designed to do the job that is now required.  The European Union has 25 member states, with more countries applying to join.  Between them, they account for 450 million consumers.

“The euro, now common currency in 12 separate countries, has gone a long way to turning national frontiers into notional frontiers, and technology is busily dismantling any trade barriers that remain.

“We need a system that can not only cope with the sheer scale of the market, but also one that is more cost effective, offers greater flexibility and creates a level playing field.”

                                                  Ends

Note to editors: a founder member of the Guild of European Business Travel Agents, the UK's Guild of Business Travel Agents boasts 34 travel management company members who between them handle 80 per cent of all British business travel transactions. The GBTA will change its name to the Guild of Travel Management Companies in January 2005

For more information: Vanessa Aves/Keira Garrigan, Brighter Group, Tel: 020 7603 2168

<back