Background Information

 

Note: First Choice Speciality Business Division is now TUI Travel Travel UK Specialist Division.

As part of a strategic plan to broaden the First Choice group to include holidays outside the Mainstream Summer Sun market, First Choice began acquiring specialist Tour Operators.

 

By 2004, the First Choice Holidays Speciality Businesses Division comprised of several brands serving specific market sectors. These brands included:  

                                        

 

Each brand within the group operated independently and used separate technology platforms to manage their sales and management.

 

It was evident to the Speciality Business division’s management team, headed by Managing Director Ian Simkins, that managing the disparate sales and management systems within the group was costly, inefficient and highly complex.

Each system was fundamentally designed to service the traditional 7/14 night package holiday market at a time when travel consumers were increasingly seeking more flexible holidays especially:

• Variable durations (7 and 14 nights was too rigid)
• Broader range of flights (including low-cost carriers)
• More flexible travel arrangements, especially for tailor-made trips

Ian Simkins therefore established a project team with a specific goal - to select and implement a single reservation platform for the group of companies within the specialist division brands.  

First Choice Specialist Division objectives

 

First Choice Holidays embarked on a comprehensive selection process with leading U.K. travel technology suppliers. Its core business objectives were as follows:

• To respond to the increasingly flexible requirements of holidaymakers
• To focus on profits, not volumes
• Consolidate product within the group
• Remove operational inefficiencies
• Reduce operational costs

 

A rigorous selection process incorporated three core phases; selecting a supplier shortlist, running requirements workshops and completing an in-depth decision matrix. Following a series of written proposals, comprehensive system demonstrations and personal presentations, Travelink was selected by First Choice as offering the best-fit in the marketplace in terms of its critical system requirements and business objectives.

Travelink System Implementation

At the time of the implementation project, Travelink offered a functionally rich sales and management system, already deployed with around 70 tour operators.

 

The proven nature of Travelink’s technology enabled the project team to target a speedy, first phase, proof-of-concept implementation, based around a vanilla Travelink solution, for Hayes and Jarvis’ “America and Canada” program.

 

This first-phase incorporated providing direct links from Travelink into an American specialist bedbank supplier, supplying a management module for Hayes and Jarvis directly contracted accommodation and delivering integrated Amadeus Global Distribution System and Hitchhiker Net Fares Automation connectivity. Hayes and Jarvis “America and Canada” program went live on a Travelink platform within 6 weeks of contract signature.

 

Importantly, the proof-of-concept stage also enabled the project team to deliver a comprehensive gap analysis, identifying specific additional developments required to support the migration of the main Hayes and Jarvis product onto a Travelink platform.

Following co-ordinated scoping, written specification and development activity the main Hayes and Jarvis product was launched on a Travelink platform 20 weeks later. With the Hayes and Jarvis call-centre, website and viewdata selling channels, each powered by Travelink, launched simultaneously.

 

During subsequent months, Travelink’s sales and management system was deployed by Meon Villas, Citalia and Sovereign  using the Hayes and Jarvis model.

 

Business Results

Hayes and Jarvis increases profit margins by 40%

(Travel Weekly, October 2006)

 

 

 

“Implementing Travelink has enabled First Choice Speciality Businesses to fundamentally reposition. We are now selling more tailor-made, long-haul, holidays at a significantly increased profit margin. Travelink has played a central role in enabling us to undertake this business transition”.

Ian Simkins, Managing Director, UK Specialist Division, TUI Travel

For further information visit our Frequently-Asked-Questions, call +44  (0)1633 627500 or email info@comtec-europe.co.uk

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