European
Commission investigation into airline ticket distribution
The
European Commission is investigating whether agreements between booking systems
Amadeus and Sabre, and airlines and travel agents, may be in breach of EU
competition law.
The
Commission is investigating whether provisions in the providers’ agreements
with airlines and agents may limit the latter’s ability to use rival suppliers
of ticket distribution. This may make it
more difficult for new distribution suppliers to enter the market and may
increase costs for airlines which are passed on to consumers.
It
will be recalled that as early as 2002 the Commission investigated the creation
of the online travel agency, Opodo. This
was a joint venture by nine of Europe’s largest travel agents offering internet
sales, hotel bookings, car hire and insurance.
The European Commission took into account a package of commitments
offered by the parties and issued a ‘negative clearance’ type of comfort
letter. In order to allay concerns that
the airlines might use the joint venture as a vehicle for collusion the parties
put in place undertakings that the shareholders would not get access to
commercially sensitive information about each other. In order to address the
concern that the airlines would favour their own operations to the detriment of
other travel agents, each undertook not to discriminate without objective justification
between other travel agents.
Commission
press release IP/18/6538
