Switchfly Partners with Conztanz to Ease the Burden of Interrupted Operations on Travelers and Airlines
SAN FRANCISCO (PRWEB) April 12, 2017 -- Switchfly, Inc., a global technology company that powers travel commerce, loyalty program engagement and ancillary merchandising solutions for some of the world's most recognizable brands, has partnered with Conztanz, a data agility platform provider covering the entire traveler journey, to address one of the biggest pain points in travel for airlines and passengers: irregular operations (IROP).
The new technology offering, called Travel Hero, will take what has historically been a very manual, inefficient, offline process—getting stranded passengers booked into hotels when their travel has been interrupted—and move it online, solving many logistical complications for airlines and significantly improving the experience of unhappy, stranded travelers.
“This product further illustrates our commitment to using technology to improve and personalize the travel experience,” said Daniel Farrar, CEO of Switchfly. “And this partnership is very complementary, as it unites the expertise of Conztanz within the airline data ecosystem with Switchfly’s breadth of technology and management of third-party suppliers. Together, we are taking a generally negative experience and making it significantly more positive—for both the passenger and airlines.”
“This partnership will allow us to bring a very powerful, combined solution to market,” said Bertrand Kientz, CEO of Conztanz. “With ConztanzOne, we are excited to enable more personalization and bring drastic improvements to irregular operations by seamlessly integrating complex back-end systems and orchestrating all relevant data into a single place.”
Travel Hero: the future of IROP
Historically, irregular operations have been a challenge and a frustration for the airline industry. Travelers, stranded due to missed connections or cancelled flights, find themselves in long lines, waiting for overwrought airline agents to manually book them rooms in nearby hotels. This inefficient and impersonal process rarely proves to be much of a comfort to already inconvenienced passengers.
In contrast, this new automated technology offering will significantly improve the process:
• Stranded passengers are automatically alerted by SMS and email
• Passengers can view all available nearby rooms and choose the hotel of their preference directly from their handheld device or laptop or airport kiosk
• Optional upgrades can be purchased using dollars or loyalty points
• The process is seamless, personalized and efficient—with no long lines
In addition to reducing customer dissatisfaction during an unpleasant time, Travel Hero will also allow airlines to:
• Earn and manage efficiencies of scale by accessing larger, cheaper hotel inventories
• Offer different hotel options based on customer loyalty tier
• Streamline their customer experience and achieve brand consistency across all stations
• Reduce agent call volume
“Travel Hero is unlike any other tool currently available,” added Farrar. “It’s also easy to implement and completely scalable. Soon, the current nightmare of irregular operations will be little more than a distant memory.”
About Conztanz
Conztanz is a software and IT consulting company, based in France, which is dedicated to easing IT and digital transformation for the air transport industry and improving the end-to- end traveler’s experience. At a time when airlines, airports and other travel industry organizations heavily rely on digital to improve their real-time commerce capability, their operations efficiency and their traveler’s experience, the ability to push relevant information at the right time to the right interface is key. ConztanzOne, our powerful integration platform, is running as an intelligent bridge between Passenger Service Systems and airlines' other systems. It collects multi-source data, deducts customer context and feeds any operational front-end—including websites and communication solutions—with immediate and smart information. Combining in-depth expertise in the air transport industry with its agile, open data platform, Conztanz speeds up the delivery of projects such as airline data migration, NDC adoption and ePNR implementation and provides turn-key solutions to empower digital channels with real-time, context-based and personalized interaction capabilities. Some of Conztanz’s customers include BRA, Luxair, Boliviana de Aviaçion, Kuwait Airways, CityJet, Air Tahiti and Air Caledonie. For more information, visit http://www.conztanz.com.
About Switchfly
Switchfly, Inc., is a global technology company that powers travel commerce, loyalty program engagement and ancillary merchandising solutions for some of the world's most recognizable brands. Leading airlines, hotels, online travel agencies and financial service providers depend on Switchfly to power their omni-channel travel experiences because it uniquely combines a highly scalable and secure architecture with deep product and content inventory. Powerful analytics and real-time decision engines foster contextually-rich customer engagement and enable brands to offer a wide range of customized travel services to their customers. Headquartered in San Francisco, Switchfly generates more than $2 billion in revenue for its clients annually and facilitates the redemption of more than 40 billion reward points and miles each year. The company's global client roster includes American Airlines, JetBlue and LAN Airlines; IAG Avios, Lufthansa Miles & More and United MileagePlus; InterContinental Hotels Group, Marriott International and Starwood Hotels and Resorts; and Groupon and Living Social. For more information, visit http://www.switchfly.com.
Media Contact:
Gaby Perez-Silva
(714) 369-2920
Gaby(at)Bospar(dot)com
Katya Lopez, Switchfly, http://www.switchfly.com, +1 (415) 407-7742, [email protected]
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