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 Its
hotel negotiating season.......... Several of
Travelogic's key Executives are involved currently with
securing competitive rates for our customers for next
year. What's been interesting is the varying trends
across the globe which may assist in our customers
having a better expectation of what they could be paying
next year. Generally the corporate market is strong with
rate growth anticipated across most markets. Parts of
North America and Europe are anticipating high single
digit increases on this year. Whilst double digit growth
is expected in many Asian cities. India is extreme with
some rates expected to increase by over 50%. Australia
is a little more reserved yet single digit growth in
rates are still anticipated. Please use our experience
and expertise in ensuring you and your travellers are
maximising your hotel expenditure.
Safe Travelling Craig
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GlobalStar
a growing force
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GlobalStar
has recently sponsored a booth at the regional Corporate Travel
World in Pattaya, Thailand.
The
year 2006 has seen many changes in the travel management market
place. These
changes have taken place across the whole provision of travel
management, ranging from changes in airline ownership, inventory
distribution, travel management company ownership and of course
security provision. In
this turmoil GlobalStar has proven to be a stable player with a
network concept that is fully capable of handling your global
travel needs.
GlobalStar is recognised as one of the fastest growing
players in the Global TMC arena.
One
important issue we want to address is the widespread perception
that only wholly owned networks can provide quality services,
stability and continuity. The demise of brands like TQ3, Synergy
and BTI Worldwide has demonstrated this vividly in the last two
years. Many truly
global customers are now left with tough decisions on whether to
remain with the lead agent and their new partners, who may of
course already have been ruled out in their tender processes or
re-tender altogether in mid contract.
The
GlobalStar concept is the most relevant for today’s situation
in terms of local ownership and global control.
We believe that the number of large corporate clients now
including GlobalStar in tenders demonstrates we are an excellent
alternative to the traditional travel management companies.
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BA change to
Sydney-Singapore-London Route
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Premium fare passengers
flying British Airways will miss the ambience of the
B747's cabin when flying to Singapore and London this
summer. From October 31 BA has decided to substitute the
popular B747 with a smaller and cheaper-to-operate B777
twin jet for flights 15 and 16 which operate to London
with an en route stop in Singapore. The carrier's
existing daily Sydney-London service via Bangkok
(flights BA9 and 10) will continue to be operated by a
B747.
It is the first time
that BA has introduced the B777 on flights to route.
Knowledgeable passengers are telling Business Traveller
that they will miss the B747's upper deck seating in
Club World and its slightly wider cabin (compared with
the B777) on the main deck (even though the seating is
still disposed eight across). One could also argue that
the first class configuration in the B747's nose is more
appealing than the routine layout on the B777. More...
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Qantas Launches
WebCheck-in
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Qantas
has finally followed Virgin Blue with the introduction of
online check-in facilities. Virgin has been offering the ability
for customers to check in online since Oct 2005,
and has heavily promoted this feature in its push for the
corporate market.
Qantas
online check-in is now available, a newly designed
bar-coded boarding pass which can be printed from home or
office before departing for the airport,
The
facility is available for domestic Qantas and Qantaslink
e-ticket customers between 24 hours and 1 hour before your
flight departure, and will see the introduction of Online
Check-in Bag Drop Counters at most airports.
In
addition if you have a return trip on the same day you can
check in for both flights at the same time.
For
more details check out www.qantas.com/checkin
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Singapore Airlines Plans
New Upgrade
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ALREADY TOPS IN BUSINESS
TRAVELLER READER SURVEYS FOR YEARS RUNNING, Singapore
Airlines unveiled a plan last week to guarantee it stays
on top. The plan -- a $360 million three-class
full-passenger-cabin upgrade -- was originally intended to
be rolled out as part of the introduction of the Airbus
superjumbo A380. However, with the subsequent A380
production delays, the airline decided to introduce the
new service on six new Boeing 777-300ERs scheduled for
delivery in the next two months.
In business class, seats will be laid out in a 1-2-1
configuration, providing immediate aisle access, a key
feature the desire for which was revealed by extensive
surveys if its most loyal customers. In first class, seats
will be 35 inches wide with 23-inch LCD monitors, in
business, seats will be 30 inches wide with 15.4-inch
screens, and in economy, the airline is moving the in-seat
entertainment controls from the armrest to the seatback
under the 10.1-inch monitors, allowing for narrower
armrests. Singapore will initially offer the upgraded
services on its new 777-300ERs and A380s, but plans to
retrofit older aircraft based on demand. Expect to
encounter the new premium cabins on long-haul services
between Singapore and Paris and Zurich next year. More...
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Mandarin Oriental Hong
Kong Re-Opens
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9 months to the day since it
closed for a comprehensive US$140 million renovation the
flagship property for the group has reopened, conveniently
located in the heart of Central the renovated hotel
features 502 luxuriously appointed guestrooms and suites.
for more details visit the website: www.mandarinoriental.com/hongkong
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Flat Seat Guide
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Flatseats.com is the global site that focuses on
"premium" airline seats,With the developing market
for lie-flat seats across the airline industry, and a
heightened awareness amongst customers, this site provides a
"one-stop" guide to lie-flat and premium class
airline seats.
Enabling rapid access to view the products on offer from the
world's leading airlines, customers can easily source data
and information about lie-flat airline seats.
Skytrax supply aviation Product and Service research
capabilities to airlines and product suppliers across the
world - drawing on unrivalled experience and expertise in
this specialist market.
Core research products from our Marketing Research section
cover airline class surveys, product Benchmarking and
ancillary competitive performance evaluation across all
aspects of the airline business.
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Lunch
boxed
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Tired of the usual airline food, or having to
wait up for it to be served before being able to go to
sleep?
Why not consider pre-ordering your own
personalised meal? Café Vue now stock lunch boxes, for $15,
you might get a Scotch quail egg, sesame fingers with baba
ghanoush, a sandwich (smoked salmon, caper mayo and rocket
on olive bread, say), salad with a test tube of vinaigrette,
a pistachio cupcake, sachets of freshly ground pepper and
Murray River salt and wooden cutlery. why not give them a
try? Café Vue, 430 Little Collins St, Melbourne, Vic,
(03) 9691 3888.
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| e-logic
Web Res Enhancements |
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exciting new developments now allow the tool to search
flight, hotel and car at the same time for both
one-way and return travel. This is a huge improvement on
the earlier version and will mean a complete booking can
now be made in under 3 minutes.
The addition of a
template function now allows travel co-ordinators to
store frequent itineraries, this can then be applied
across the company or applied to the travellers under
the travel co-ordinator. |
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| Face
Value |
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| Video
conferencing technology promised to allow us to conduct
business without ever leaving the office again, so why
do we still fly around the world to attend meetings?
It wasn't so long ago
that experts were predicting the end of business travel.
Advances in video conferencing would mean that
colleagues and clients could meet and do business
without leaving the comfort of their office. A decade or
so later this technology has improved, but air travel
continues to thrive — more people than ever are
travelling on business. So why is it that in this age of
long queues and delays, many people still prefer to meet
in person rather than via a TV screen? Firstly, because
the costs of travel have dropped. As the evolution in
video and web conferencing occurred, so did a revolution
in the low-cost airline market, reducing the cost
incentive of meeting virtually. More.... |
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Want
your own copy? You can arrange it from here!
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The
Editor, Travelogic, Level 11, 15 Castlereagh Street, SYDNEY NSW 2000 Tel:+61 2
9230 7500
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| Travelogic is a Partner of GlobalStar
Travel Management |
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| Travelogic is a member of Travelscene
American Express |
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Partner
of GlobalStar Travel
Management
®
A
worldwide joint-venture partnership of leading travel companies
leveraging
the buying
power from
sales in excess of 5 billion dollars. GlobalStar
partners deliver worldwide, culturally sensitive travel management
solutions with a distinct commitment to high standards in service
excellence, true
global price sourcing and integrated information
systems.
More information: www.globalstartravel.net
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