The travel industry is facing a big year in 2014 for many and varied reasons.
Consumers are set for big things as there is a good sentiment shaping up for the New Year and this means people will want to travel.
While there are always things that governments and the world can present at any given moment, I remain optimistic of a strong trading year for travel.
Sure, the exchange rate might bounce around, but while interest rates remain at these record lows – and there is no real sign of any pending spike with these – and unemployment remains relatively low, meaning people have job security, they will travel. In fact, even the federal government’s own forecasts have people traveling outbound from Australia in their droves in 2014.
So the industry should be well placed to grab every little bit and every booking it can in the year ahead. In the mix of this very positive take on life, the full implementation of the new accreditation scheme will come into play.
ATAS will be born in full and introduced to consumers in 2014. This will spark all sorts of conversations and interest in travel agents and I am clearly of the view this will be positive as the value proposition that we are building for ATAS is compelling.
With the collapse of yet another airline at the end of last year, fortunately not of a particularly large scale but nevertheless an airline collapse, it was a very timely reminder of the lack of protection that existed in 2013 for both the consumer and indeed the travel agents.
The forthcoming year brings new life to this protection in the form of the insurance products being introduced to the market and this will enable agents to minimise their risk of exposure. This in turn will provide protection for their customers. A compelling reason to use a travel agent.
More broadly across the travel and tourism industry we will be bedding down a new federal government and a new minister for tourism. Albeit that it is not in his title it is the new way of thinking when it comes to federal ministers.
Their title is not what is important. What is important is the measurement of their outputs and their ability to bring real polices and solutions to the many issues faced by the industry, and many of those have been on the table for a long time.
I have been on the record saying that the previous government provided the travel and tourism industry with 4000 cups of tea, but what we actually wanted was a few outcomes. Let’s hope that the new federal government serves less tea and more outcomes.
Finally I hope in 2014 we will see some real rubber hit the road on the New Distribution Capability from IATA and the airlines.
The planning and talking phase has been extensive. And as results of the pilots and as more concrete answers come forward about the commercial models and how agents will be rewarded for using the NDC, I hope 2014 will deliver outcomes on these fronts.
The world moves quickly these days and old school thinking about taking years to work something out just does not work anymore. Let’s hope that this will not be the case for NDC as the details start to emerge from the darkness.
As a person who is far more positive than negative, I am feeling really confident that the year ahead will be a very big and very good year.
