Booking

Booking or reservation is the electronic transaction which secures the rights to the services for a particular end user.

Booking procedure in Websky

To book a service in Websky online booking system, it is required to to fill in the booking form and proceed next.

After the successful booking, the user (customer) receives the confirmation where status, ID and the final booking amount are set, Websky system shows user the information about the time to pay for the booking and sends booking notifications to the emails of the customer and the agency. If the payment was not made or commited, the order will be automatically cancelled (if the auto-cancellation of unpaid bookings is enabled for the agency. Order ticketing is available only after the booking is paid. Booking data are available on the client’s personal account page, and they can uploaded for the following creation of management accounting in the XML format. If there was a price increase while proceeding to a booking, theuser will receive a notification “Order price was increased during the booking” and the two variants will be offered:

• To book an order with the new price;
• Get back to the search results to choose a new flight.

Verification of entered data

General rules for all GDSs

• Full name:
  • Only latin letters without spaces are allowed.
  • Double surname (name, patronymic) is indicated separated by hyphen.
  • In order to follow the orders of the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation, in addition to the surname / name, the passenger's middle name (if any) must be indicated in the “PNR” field in the “NAME” PNR bookings on domestic flights (entered by a space after the name). The request to the GDS is implemented in such a way that if the middle name of the passenger is indicated in the middle name field, it is transmitted to the GDS through a space with the name.
  • Booking tickets for passengers with the same surnames and names is not possible.
• E-mail: only numbers and latin letters are allowed. In addition, there is an additional check for the existence of the entered e-mail address (it checks if the domain has a mail server). After an unsuccessful check, a recommendation appears, indicating a possible error in the entered data, but this does not prevent the booking form from being sent.
• Document number — only numbers, latin letters and dash are allowed. Length of number is not less than 5 and not more than 14 symbols.
• Document validity — must be longer than the trip. If the validity period of the passport is taken from the profile and it is less than the date of the last segment, then the validity period is automatically set equal to the date of the last segment of the flight + 1 day.
• Booking dublicates blocking:
  • In order to avoid penalties from airlines, this functionality works by default and blocks the possibility of booking if the data on passengers, flight, supplier and agency ID in the GDS are the same, and the status of an existing similar order has not been canceled. When the functionality is triggered, appears an error of the following form: An order for this flight and the set of passengers already exists.

In addition to the error, the logs display information about previously created and not yet canceled similar reservations: DUPLICATE_BOOKING_ID:{BookId};DUPLICATE_LOCATOR:{Locator}.

• • Blocking process can be adjusted — to do this, contact techical support. Adjustment is necessary to meet the requirements of an airline. You can set the blocking by two criteria: after a certain time after cancellation or after a certain number of cancellations.

GDS Sirena Travel

• 'Full name:
  • Only letters without spaces are allowed (latin and cyrillic).
  • Cyrillic is allowed only when issuing a ticket for flights in Russia and the CIS.
  • Maximum 25 symbols for each field.
  • The total length of the passenger's full name should not exceed 49 characters. (It should be noted that that airlines also have features. For example, for Aeroflot airline, the maximum permissible number of full name symbols is 57).
  • The use of letters of different alphabets at the same time is not allowed - in case of simultaneous use of the Cyrillic and Latin letters, all data in the Cyrillic alphabet will be transliterated into the Latin alphabet.
• Available Document Types:
  • Passport of the Russian Federation,
  • Military ID for conscript or contract
  • International passport,
  • Residence,
  • Temporary ID
  • Birth certificate,
  • Certificate of return to the CIS countries

.

• Document number — only letters, numbers and dashes, not more than 14. Latin and cyrillic letters are allowed.

• Airline loyalty card: only latin letters and numbers, no more than 23.

Passenger information

When booking an order in which a child and/or infant (with or without seat) is present, the passenger's age is determined at the departure date of the first segment. For Turkish Airlines and Air France, passenger age is determined at the departure date of the last segment. If on the departure date of the first segment the child is 11 years old, then he belongs to the Children category of passengers and flies for the children's fare. If on the date of departure of the first segment he was already 12 years old, then you need to book a ticket for him as an adult. The same is for the infant. Similarly, for the Turkish Airlines and Air France airlines, the last segment is used.

Template:Attention When trying to book an order with the same full name of passengers, an error message is displayed, the text of which can be changed in the Language Resources section.

Booking process setup

The booking process for all components Websky is configured in the section For technical support → Outdated settings → Booking settings.

Via the drop-down list at the top of the page, select the area of the system whose parameters will open for editing:

• User — the object (the entire agency/manager/user, etc.) of the application of the parameters.
• Change — system component:
  • Flight — booking air tickets,
  • Hotel — hotel reservation,
  • Railway ticket — booking of railway transportation,
  • Arbitrary service.

Booking setup parameters

• Document issue for all successfull bookings:
  • immediately after the paid status is set — includes auto-ticketing after receiving the payment "paid" status of the order (recommended),
  • 'manually by clicking on the Issue button — turns off automatic billing, after payment, to issue an order, click on the issue button.
• Client form type — type of booking form that is displayed to the client:
  • B2C: user data — booking form with fields for entering user data,
  • B2B: company data (simplified) — booking form with fields for entering company data.
  • B2B, also for anonim users — similar to the previous type. By default, for the guest (anonim) the B2C form of the customer is loaded, but when this type of form is enabled, the guest will see the B2B form.
• Pre-filled passengers and client data — pre-filling of customer/passenger information based on data from a selected source:
  • Pre-fill a client data from an user profile,
  • Pre-fill data for the first passenger from an user profile,
  • Pre-fill client data from a profile of an agency (for B2B form),
• Display booking number in the booking system — Enables the display of the supplier locator in the order. Template:Attention
• Use the «Travel Profiles» function — enables the ability to select a passenger from the user’s passenger list when filling in the Passengers block on the Booking form.
  Information about the user's passengers is displayed on the page …/poffice__my_passengers.
• «Travel Profiles» limit — The setting determines the maximum number of passengers saved.
• Displaying tourist profiles for managers and experts.
• Show agency charges for — включает отображение сборов для выбранных типов пользователей:
  • All,
  • Expert,
  • User,
  • Company manager,
  • Company expert,
  • Company user.
    Template:Attention For the railway component, when using the UFS search type, charges will be displayed forcibly. For UIT, charges will be displayed depending on the settings (if the parameter is not set, charges will be visible).
    Template:Attention
    For the Air Tickets component, the parameter is associated with the settings from the section Product control → Aviatickets → Outdated settings → Search restrictions: 'Price display in results и Price display in confirmation. It indicates the possibility of creating and editing price rules in the administrative part. The parameter from the Booking settings section has the highest priority.
• How charges are displayed in the price table — the choice of how to display the agency charge in the price details for each type of passenger:
  • On a separate line — charge amount is displayed in a separate line,
  • XP tax — charge amount is displayed as a fee with the XP code.
• Tax display method — way to display taxes on the booking form in the order information block:
  • Tax amount — tax amount value,
  • Amount of taxes with details in popup — does not work,
  • Tax detailing — full amount with details on the size and code of each tax.
• Break down the price by each passenger — enables a breakdown of the price table per line for each passenger. If the option is disabled, the price is grouped by passenger type.
• QR-code encodes — selection of the object for qr-code encoding:
  • Link to the page with order information,
  • Order information.
• Display birthplace field — (only for the railway component!) includes the input field of the birthplace in the passenger data input field.

Air tickets booking settings

Для настройки процесса бронирования авиабилетов зайдите в раздел Product control → Aviatickets → Outdated settings → Customization. The options in this section apply only to the Airline component.

Parameters for setting up a ticket booking form are described in the article Booking form (Air tickets).

Air tickets booking process settings

• Sending email from web service — after booking, an email from the GDS with the booking results is sent to the user's email address. At the moment, only GDS Sabre, Amadeus and Galileo support the function. To correctly display the agency name and sender address, you need to make changes to the TJR record in IPCC.
• Sending the booking status letter — After booking, an email from Websky with the booking results will be sent to the user's email address.
• Send itinerary receipt separately for each passenger — enables sending the itinerary receipt in a separate letter to each passenger. If the passenger’s email address is not specified, the itinerary receipt is transmitted to the customer’s address. Using the variables% PASS_NAME% and% PASS_LASTNAME%, you can specify the passenger’s first and last name in the message header.
• Allow buyer to select the seat — see Seat Map.
• Show visa fields for countries — in this field, enter the list of countries for which visa data fields are displayed at the step of entering passenger data.
• Show country of residence fields with visa fields — along with visa data, the arrival point will be offered to enter (US by default).
• Show agent reward — enables displaying agent rewards on the booking confirmation page.
• Step-by-step indicator — enables booking stages indicator on top of the booking form so that the user can see at what step of booking air tickets he is, what steps he went through and which steps are left.

• Do not reduce the price when booking and updating — prohibits the order price reduction if order price decreases while checking flight availability/booking/updating. Only works with the Pricing 2.0 module. Such orders fall into the special queue Fixed Price in the agency’s personal account. Select an operating mode:
  • Through preserving old fares: always — a lower price will not be fixed in the order by the method of preserving old fares in the order.
  • Through preserving old fares: only if fare code was changed — a lower price will not be fixed only if the fare code has changed.
  • Through adding agency charge: always — "recommended mode for the option". The lower price will not be fixed in the order by the method of adding "fixing charge".
  • Never — option disabled. Lower price is always displayed in the order.
    This setting works when there was a change in the fare or tax price, including the ones caused by currency shifts. When the agency charge is lowered, the option does not work. When the number of passengers and, after that, the order price is lowered, the option does not work as well.

Price fixing is triggered when: 1) passenger codes in the fare did not change (for example, ADT -> ADT); 2) passenger codes changed (CNN -> CH), but the set and order of passengers attached to the fare did not change (1st -> 1st).
While paying for the order via the GDS processing, if the Do not reduce the price when booking and updating setting is triggered, the order will be sent to the standard processing.
If you wish to use price fixing option, we recommend you to use fixing through adding agency charge.

• Apply price fixing in the following cases — if the Do not reduce the price when booking and updating parameter is set to Always mode, and the system received price reduction, then you can set the stages of fixing. If no item is selected, fixing will be executed on all the stages — before booking, after booking, during the order update.
  • Before booking when updating flight price — price fixing is executed when switching from the search results page to the booking page.
  • Right after booking — price fixing is executed after booking the order.
  • During the synchronisations after booking — price is fixed at every update of a booked order.
• Calculation of maximum possible discount for price fixing — the setting allows to minimize the cases of price increase on the stage of ordering from search to ticketing.

Available discount calculation modes:

• • No — discount does not apply. Default.
  • Absolute value (not more than) — the discount will work if the difference between old and new price is not higher than the indicated value in the The size of the maximum allowable discount for price fixing.
  • Percent from agency profits — discount will work if the difference between old and new price is not more than percent calculated from the agency profit. Agency profit includes airline commission minus subagent commission, agency charge, airline bonus, service package and promotions.

• Confirmation of exit from the passenger data page — when updating or closing the window, turns on the display of the browser warning, for example, Do you really want to leave this page?
  You can add additional text to the service notification via the text variable close_thickbox_title, but the following restrictions are in force:
  • Each browser has its own service text.
  • Mozilla Firefox does not support additional text.
  • A popup does not appear in Opera.
• Hide charges to taxes on the itinerary receipt — distributes the charge to all the passengers for whom the ticket price is not zero, masks the charge as tax with XP code.
• Perform accessibility check by taking seats — enables the availabilty check through temporary seat reservation on the segments (supported only by GDS Sabre). If the option is disabled, the regular availability check is carried out.
• Offer other fare if seat taking is impossible — enables automatic search of the other fare if there was a denial after the availability check. New fare is checked again for availability, if the response is negative, the procedure is repeated until the available one is found or until there are no more fares on the flight. When the available fare is found, a popup window with the new price is shown to the user. The setting works only if the Processing of unavailable segments module is enabled. Availability check is executed:
  • when switching from search results to booking flight,
  • when sending a flight booking request.
    Template:Attention
• Waiting time for segments with NN status during the booking (sec.) — if the system gets segments with NN status, segment status check will be executed every 5 seconds during the established time. If segments are confirmed, the booking is successfully finished, and if segments did not receive the confirmed status, order is cancelled.
• List of airlines requiring a middle name for flights within the Russian Federation — field for entering codes of airlines for which the Middle name field should be displayed on the booking form in the in the block for passenger data. The parameter is applied when the option Optional middle name for all passengers for airlines from the list of the Air tickets: additional fields parameter is enabled; it can be found in the Product control → Aviatickets → Processes → Booking form section (see passenger information block settings).
• Agency rules for fares — field for entering the text of agency rules for fares. Entered text will be placed between fare code and the title Fare Rules, if no sub-section of fare rules is viewed. It is possible to use HTML. You can enter different text for different languages.
• Hide order price in the suppliers itinerary receipt
• Use itinerary receipt preview page — enables the button for transition to the page allowing to preview itinerary receipt on the order page (only for issued orders). You cannot print, send to an email or download the IR in PDF on the preview page.
• Use supplier’s itinerary receipt in PDF — enables receiving IR from GDS, IR template is ignored (works only for DGS Sirena). Disabled by default.
• Airlines for which to carry out separate price fixing — when the Do not fix price reduction when booking and updating function is triggered, option enables price fixing of only the part of the flight price which is reduced. For example, fare was increased and taxes were lowered, the full price of the flight lowered as well.

опция включает при срабатывании функции Не фиксировать уменьшение цены при бронировании и обновлении фиксацию только той составляющей стоимости перелета, которая уменьшается. Например, тариф увеличился, а таксы снизились, в целом общее стоимость перелета снизилась. Thus, the price of taxes will not change, but the fare will increase. You can enable the option for all the airlines or for the listed ones:

• • All — option is enabled for all the airlines.
  • Selected — option is enabled only for the selected airlines.
• Allow to change the validating carrier when updating the order — the option changes the primary validating carrier for the flight when GDS validating carrier is changed.

• Create the "OTHER" remark — if this setting is enabled, then, during the ticket booking in GDS Sirena Travel, "OTHER" remark is created, indicating information about the agent: Agency ID, ID of the user who created the booking and the ID of subagency in the third party CRM (if this field is filled in the corresponding setting in the subagent’s company profile).

Citizenship and type of document for booking form 1.0

Citizenship is assigned by country from the user profile.

The set of types of documents available to the user when booking depends on the parameter Offer all possible types of passenger documents.

It is forbidden to choose the birth certificate as document for international flights.

Go to Product control → Aviatickets → Outdated settings → Adjustment:

• Default document type for domestic airlines.
• Default document type for international airlines.

If the values of these parameters are not set, default document type depends on the flight type (domestic or international) which is defined on the base of the country set in the agency settings.
Example: in the Agency settings, in the Country field, Russia is indicated, the flight is Moscow - St. Petersburg. Then the type of flight is internal and default document type in the passenger information block is internal passport.