IATA signs up Stanchart for EasyPay facility – Times of India

MUMBAI: International Air Transport Association (IATA) has signed up Standard Chartered Bank to provide a ‘pay as you go’ service to travel agents that replaces the traditional billing and settlement system.
The new system is aimed at increasing the digitisation of payments that will result in improving cash flows for the aviation industry and for the travel agents.
In the earlier system, the agents would receive credit for tickets.
As one of IATA’s EasyPay service providers in India, Stanchart said it will provide greater payment flexibility to travel agents.
“This new payment method based on ‘pay-as-you-go’ provides a secure alternative to traditional Billing and Settlement Plan payment methods (cash or credit card) and is available to all the IATA accredited agents in India. With the client-centric approach of simplified banking, the Bank has been investing heavily in innovating and enhancing its digital capacities and this solution is a testament of the Bank’s commitment,” Stanchart said in a statement.
Based on Application Program Interface (API), IATA’s EasyPay will identify the travels agents who make the payments in a dedicated IATA EasyPay account with Standard Chartered Bank, India and release the tickets to the agents in real-time. This option is a voluntary programme where smaller agents stand to benefit as they would not need to issue bank guarantee to secure the tickets and facilitate seamless settlement of funds.
Apurva Jain, Head, Cash Products and Transaction Banking, India and South Asia, Standard Chartered Bank, said that travel agents can continue with their existing banking relationship while making payments through Standard Chartered Bank to airlines.