RJ, SITA sign IT business agreement

This will thus enable interoperability with all the other airlines in the oneworld alliance which RJ was invited to join in October 2005 as the first Arab and Middle Eastern country member in any of the three global airline alliances.

President/CEO Samer Majali signed the agreement with SITA Senior Vice President for Passenger and Travel Solutions Richard Stokes. He said that SITA will offer a number of products and solutions, including e-ticketing, enabling RJ to attain IATA's 2007 100% e-ticketing goal.

Majali added that the 3-year agreement with SITA will enable the airline to make significant progress, implementing SITA's Departure Control System (DCS) and pricing, exposing Royal Jordanian to more audience through the website and securing internet booking. Implementing online systems will allow RJ to optimize yield and reduce cost, particularly reduced cost of issuing a ticket, as paper tickets that cost $10 will be replaced with e-tickets costing $1, said Majali.

"Some key elements were decisive in our choice of SITA, not least its e-commerce solution and its over 55-year experience in working with giant world airlines. The agreement will increase our ability to reduce our cost base and increase our yield. It was important also that SITA could enable us to comply with the oneworld requirements," he said.

Majali added that the $3.2 million contract will provide IT applications that are in concordance with RJ and oneworld requirements, and the smooth operation of these applications which will allow effective, round-the-clock work through the IT department at Royal Jordanian. Around 600 RJ people will be given on-the-job training to operate these applications.

Stokes said that RJ has reason to be proud for having been invited to join oneworld, pointing out that RJ's commitment to the oneworld standards of safety, security and customer service were clearly reasons behind the invitation.

"This move by Royal Jordanian is further confirmation that airlines are looking for straightforward solutions to simplify their distribution and prefer a holistic approach to the challenges of optimizing yield while offering state-of-the-art shopping tools to the consumer. SITA now offers unbeatable one-stop shop to address all these complex issues from on-line distribution to revenue management. The airline will benefit from the reduced costs of online distribution while also improving customer service through its own website. SITA's Airfare Shop will provide the airline's customers with significant shopping capability,"

said Stokes.