The Overview of Airline

Reservation

What is GDS & CRS?

CRS: a Computer Reservation System for an individual
airline containing information on that airline only and
used by that airlines employees.

GDS: Global Distribution System - a computer

reservation and information system that is often operated
by multiple airlines, used by travel agents & other travel
professionals and contains information on all types of
travel products. It is also used for hotel, car rental, etc..

GDS consolidates information from many

Airlines.
Allowing travel agents, businesses and
individuals to shop in a single electronic
Marketplace.



Global Distribution System-GDS

GDS

(real time)

History Of CRS
Prior to 1960-: availability boards and Lazy Susan &
desk sets for travel agents.
1953-64: IBM and American Airlines created SABRE
new operating system (Transaction Processing Facility)
fast response time (< 3seconds)
international network - no down time.

1965-1976: other similar systems were developed e.g.

APOLLO, PARS.

Airline Reservations Before CRSs

Manual processing of calls from agents
Costly call centers to handle growing air travel
volume

Beginning Of GDS concept

1974: Joint Industry Computerized Reservation
System (JICRS) was initiated.
1976: Retail automation: terminals in travel
agents offices.
1978: Co-host program
1980s: many airlines merge partially due to
CRS needs
1986: GDS operations split off from airline.

Global Connectivity
1981/2: SystemOne and DATAS
1987: Galileo and Amadeus in Europe and
Abacus in Asia.
1990: PARS & DATAS merge to form
WORLDSPAN
1993: Galileo and Apollo merge.
1995: SystemOne and Amadeus merge.

Major Airline Affiliations with GDS

SABRE
Tavelocity On line
GALILEO

AMADEUS
WORLDSPAN

American Airlines
UAL, BA, Swiss, KLM,
USAir,Alitalia, Air Canada,
Austrian, Aer Lingus
Lufthansa, Air France, Iberia,
Continental
Delta, NW, TransWorld,
Abacus

GDS Accessibility
GDS
Interface

Booking Engine

GDS data
network

INTERNET

Consumer

Travel Agency

GDS Hardware software

Sabre
Oracle
sun java
Galileo/Apollo
Oracle
sun
Amadeus
Oracle
sun
Worldspan
Oracle database
uses Compaq Web servers

Market Shares of the GDS

Air Segments Booked

Sabre
Galileo
Amadeus
Worldspan

32.8%
30.7%
24.4%
12.1%

Market Share of Travel Agencies

Number of Terminals

Sabre
Galileo
Amadeus
Worldspan

59,000
160,000
155,000
18,000

15%
41%
39.5%
4.6%

TRAVEL AGENT USE of GDS

98% of all agencies are connected to GDS
some have multiple systems
they use GDS to book:
95% domestic air
86% international air
74% car rentals
55% hotel bookings
60% rail
7% cruise

Airlines
and other
suppliers
CRS

Systems and
infrastructure

CRS

CRS

public / private network

GDS

public / private network

Customers
travel
agent

travel
agent

Airline

Agent

aMaDUES
Customer

Auditor

Customer

CRS and Internet

The Travelocity site has more than 300,000 Web

pages which can be searched instantaneously.
their servers are powerful and fast, and
can churn out 30 to 40 Web pages per second
database handler being able to process 5,000
requests per second

* From www.networkmagazine.com/case_studies/working.html

Airlines

Sub Agent

Passenger

IATA fare or
Pax fare

Passenger

Airlines

Passenger

IATA or Agent
Consolidator agent
Sub Agent
Passenger

Regional Data Processing Center ( RDPC )

BSP LINK

IATA

Airlines

Bank

UNISIS

Agent

Billing Statement will Separate for 3 channel

1. Agent 2. Airlines 3. IATA

GDS
Abacus
Amadeus
Galileo
Worldspan
Sabre
Infini

Airlines
IATA

(THAILAND)

IATA

(AGENT)

Bank Guarantee

 Agent BSP
IATA AGENT Passenger Cargo
Airlines BSP LINK Agent
Report 7 1-7,8-15,16-23,24-31
Agent
15 30

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

7.
8.
9.

1
EC Airlines 3 Airlines
Bank guarantee IATA 2
Agent
Training
IATA
2
5
IATA Agent

IATA

. 20 ( VAT 7%)



1970
(De-regulation)

American Airlines (AA)

Sabre system

CRS- Computer Reservations System

GDS Global Distribution System
Real Time

Airline
Travel Agent


web site

GDS Names
1A Amadeus
1B Abacus
(Asia/Pacific)
1E Travelsky (China)
1F Infini (Japan)
1G Galileo International
1J Axess (Japan)
1P Worldspan
1S Sabre (previously
1W)
1U ITA Software

1V Apollo (Galileo)
Atraxis (ex-swissair now
EDS)
Topas (Korea)
Fantasia (South Pacific)
N1 Nextres' Iridian
Project (Scandinavia)
SITA's Gabriel
Ix-Hotel (International)
TechSpan

Major GDSs in Thailand

Amadeus
Galileo
Worldspan
Abacus



(Global Distribution System)

Traveler

Travel Agent

-Sabre

AA

-Amadeus

AF, LH, SK

-Galileo

UA

-Abacus

CX, SQ, MH

-World Span

DL, NW, TW

-Topaz

Korea Government

-Axess

JL

-Infini

NH

Airlines
Hotels
Cars
Cruises

 Real Time
-
-

online

SITA

- (Availability)

Airline Phonetic Code A-Z

A = Able B = Baker

/

TG, SQ, MH

LONDON

LHR and LGW

NEWYORK
JFK, EWR
and LGA
(La Guardia)

Airline Phonetics

Able
Baker
Charlie
Dog
Easy
Fox
George
How
Item
Jimmy
King
Love
Mike
Nan

Obo
Peter
Queen
Roger
Sugar
Tare
Uncle
Victor
William
York
Zebra

Class of Services

Port Station

R
P
F
A
J
C
S
W
Y
B
H

=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=

Supersonic Class
First Class Premium/Luxury First Class
First Class
First Class Discounted
Business Class Premium
Business Class/SKY Coach Class
Standard Class
Coach Economy Premium Class
Coach Economy Class
Coach Economy/Discounted Class
Coach Economy/Discounted Class

Class of Services

B
H
Q
M
T
K
L
V
U

=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=

Coach Economy/Discounted Class

Coach Economy/Discounted Class
Coach Economy/Discounted Class
Coach Economy/Discounted Class
Coach Economy/Discounted Class
Thrift Discounted Class
Thrift Discounted Class
Thrift Discounted Class
Air Shuttle (no reservations)





1. , ,
-

2.
3.

4. , , ,
5.

6.

, Flight ,

)

Focalpoint



(Special Service Request

SSR)

(Noodle)

Sea food
(vegetarian meal)

-

-
- (Infant)
-

(Unaccompanied minor)

vv.


vv.

vv.

Example of PNR
1
2
3
4
5

6
7
8

CMTBIY
BKKAG43 AS PL 0656Z/2JAN
1. 1BOONMEESRI/MANEE MRS
1. TG910 J TH12JAN BKKLHR HK 1 0030 0620
2. TG HTL TH12JAN LHR HK 1 OUT 15JAN SGLB HILTO
3. TG CAR TH12JAN LHR HK 1 15JAN AVIS RENUALT A-LHR/A-LHR/P1
4. TG915 J SA 4MAR LHRBKK HK 1 1015 0620*1
FONE-BKKA643-3815064 C/O KHUN MONTICHA
TKT-T/217 4204458950/12DEC03
G-FAXOSI YY AUXI
SSR VGML TG NN1 BKKLHR0910J12JAN
SSR VGML TG NN1 LHRBKK0915J15JAN
SSR FQTVTGHK/TGZJ27459/P1

EXERCISE