580 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM As far as Europe is concerned the situation is as follow: 1. As far as we are aware there is very limited adoption of NDC, including by airlines. The carriers listed on IATA/NDC website as «full NDC capable» have probably satisfied some NDC testing, including the process of one reservation/ ticketing transaction in an NDC environment. However to our knowledge most airlines are not ready yet to implement the NDC standard for their direct connect or GDS transactions. The vast majority of smaller/regional carriers have not done any preparation and probably do not intend to do so in the foreseeable future. 2. Neither ECTAA nor the ECTAA members’ associations support NDC. This is a commercial decision, which each individual travel agency takes based on its best business interests. To our knowledge some large OTA / TMC may have expressed “some interest” for NDC. But since there is no substantial offer from the airline side and the airlines’ direct connect booking platforms are not operational yet or with a very poor content, the “interest” of the industry is purely theoretical”. Following the same analysis, in a questioning carried out by another WTAAA member, Mr de Blust continued: “ECTAA expressed reservations about NDC since the adoption of the NDC resolution in 2012. (Resolution 787 of the Passenger Services Conference). First, NDC is a standard adopted by the airlines and which contains little or no benefits for the agency community. In particular compared with the GDS in which travel agents are able to search and compare flights and provide the best available offer to their customers, ECTAA considered that NDC is going to limit the access to air fares and limit also the possibility of comparison between different airlines’ fares. In addition, the adoption and implementation of NDC e.g. using airlines’ direct connect platforms will require significant investments for the agents in terms of hardware and software. Direct connect platforms will require an integrator and a full adaptation of the agency’s mid- and back offices functionalities. This costs money!!! Second, NDC poses serious problems in relation with data protection and in particular with the new European regulation on personal data called GDPR (I am sure you have heard of it). Basically according to the NDC standard (see resolution 787) in order to access fares from an airline, the agent may have to disclose the customers’ details to the
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