Lata's cash sale limit under review

THE decision to introduce a
remittance holding capacity
(RHC) as part of the New
Generation Iata Settlement
Solutions (New Gen ISS) has
been put on hold following the
working group that was held in
Geneva earlier this month.
The RHC, which Iata defines
as “a monetary threshold to
the agent’s outstanding cash
sales”, could see agents
restricted in the number of
airline tickets they can sell
(see TNW July 27).
“The number of agents that
could be affected by the RHC
at some point in the year
related to the formula Iata
has used to calculate when
an agent would be at risk
of reaching the RHC limit, is
extremely high,” says Otto
de Vries, ceo of Asata. Iata
is expected to put forward a
new proposal by mid-October,
he says.
Another working group
explored a separate initiative,
also part of New Gen ISS –
the introduction of alternative
payment methods of settling
a BSP account. The initial
focus of this proposal was
on developing Iata’s pay-asyou-go
EasyPay solution, says
Otto, but this has shifted
to establishing a standard
that would allow other thirdparty
payment mechanisms
to also be introduced. The
establishment of new payment
methods and other proposals,
part of New Gen ISS (currently
underpinned by resolution 8xx
which will eventually replace
818g of the Iata handbook)
will be put to a vote at the
next PaConf in Singapore.
“However, although the
elements around new payment
methods will be voted on
at the next PaConf, [the
working groups] requested
these proposals be recorded
in a resolution of their own
because they are so complex,”
says Otto.