ABC News Interview: Why people fail to book their flight on their own?

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ABC News Interview: Why do people fail to book their flight on their own? This article uncovers the unknown strategies used by travel agents to bring people home with a 100% success rate.

Thousands of Australians remain locked out of the country, and caps on international arrivals remain low, due to ongoing COVID-19 outbreaks in NSW and Victoria.

But the Federal Government’s plan has caps on international arrivals being adjusted upwards, once 80 per cent of the eligible population has been vaccinated, floating the possibility that, this year, some Australians will be home by Christmas.

Listeners with friends, family members and loved ones stranded overseas share their thoughts and hopes on when they will be able to return.

Nicolas_Delacharlerie-Agent-min — Nicolas Delarcharlerie from World Travel Connections has been recognised in the news multiple times for his ability to bring Australian home during the Covid-19 Pandemic

ABC News Interview on Life Matters

Michael Mackenzie: Nicolas Delacharlerie is a Sydney based travel agent, and Nicolas is one of the many travel agents around this country who are trying to get Australians back home. Have you managed to get as many people as possible back in this country over the last 18 months, what kind of figures do you have for that?

Nicolas Delacharlerie: We have fairly large number. It is around 150-200. It does not seem to be a very large number, however, it is based on a 100% success rate. There is a large number of people stranded overseas and it really depends on what we can do at the time.

Michael Mackenzie: And Nicolas when you say 150-200 people over the last 18 months, as you said it does not seem like a large number, but is it because of quotas on seats on airlines, is this why this is limited?

Nicolas Delacharlerie: There this in the equation and there is also the fact that a lots of people are trying to do it themselves. This is not really great way to go about it. Because when you do it yourself, you do not take into consideration what needs to happen. In our situation, depending on the passenger passport, you can transit in one country but may not be able to transit another. Because people are desperate to come home they will try literally everything and one thing would be to go to the internet because the internet tells you what you want to hear. What happens next is that the customer goes on the net, they book the flight, and they feel very good but they do not realise that the flight may be the result of a fake of availability and it does happen. For example, you should look at a London to Sydney via Hong-Kong. Now in that specific example the Hong-Kong to Sydney is a Code-Share with Cathay-Pacific and British-Airways. British-Airways would not have updated their availability on the Code-Share flight number, so the passenger is able to book online flight but the seat is unavailable.

Michael Mackenzie: Hence, the description that you have made earlier as “fake of availability” because not all the logistical part of the journey has been put in place?

Nicolas Delacharlerie: That’s right, also what is important here is that we are not in Australian peace keeping time. We are in a war against health here. For example, if you are arriving from Europe to Australia, you can’t be having 2 tickets. Because that means that your bag may come out at the transit point and you may be required to clear customs which you are unable to because you are not entering the country but transiting. There is a big difference between entering and transiting. Transiting requires to stay less than 24h and making your journey onto the next aircraft. When you stop over it is a different story and none of the countries that we use, allow you to enter. So if you have 2 tickets, although those flights may be confirmed, you may not be able to board the aircraft at your starting point because the airline may say we can’t check you in at the next flight as you may be required to clear custom at the transit point.

Michael Mackenzie: Nicolas in this example you have just opened a whole can of worms, for people like me, I had not even thought through. I can see how this can be a nightmare. Nicolas Delacharlerie is a Sydney based travel agent and Nicolas has been already pointing out some of the pitfall when people with all the will in the world, want to try and control their own destiny, and trying to book online only to find out there is a fake of availability.

Nicolas Delacharlerie: When sometime you have what we call a Code-Share flight, when an aircraft flies the revenue is often divided between 3-4 different airlines so that the finance is feasible so you have what we call the marketing carrier, which is the airline who is selling the flight and then you have the operating carrier which is the airline which is operating the flight. So for example if the Hong-Kong Sydney is marketed as British Airways, and if Cathay-Pacific is operating the flight then if British Airways has a flight number and they have not updated the availability, then the customer is going to be able to book under the British Airways flight number but the reality is that there may not be any seat on the aircraft.

Michael Mackenzie: It is only people like you on the inside of the industry that understand those subtleties and also know how to get through that system. And Nicolas we need help here because some of the stories from Mathilda and Jane are about people who have been trying for months. Sometimes you have broken through often because there is great need for example of a boy who needed surgery, tell us that story.

Nicolas Delacharlerie: Well it was back earlier this year in February, one of the local government contacted me and said to me: Nicolas, this is what is happening, this young boy is in Pakistan has a spinal cord surgery, it is an emergency, he really needs to come home, the Pakistani agent cannot get anywhere, can you help? So I jumped onboard and with the help of my travel partners, and we shook the earth and made it happen. What happened in this situation is that we did something that we call an above the cap confirmation, that is not something we cannot do under normal circumstances, you cannot do it online. Hence we request on medical ground and emergency through the Australian Government the permission to come on the flight above the allocated cap.

Michael Mackenzie: And Nicolas when you do that, do the travel channels open up in this kind of emergency?

Nicolas Delacharlerie: We have to do it manually, there is a procedure behind it that needs to happen, that availability opens up and that flight becomes confirmed, just like we did yesterday for someone whose father died in Australia 48 hours ago, we were able to get 2 seats from Los Angeles to Sydney.

Michael Mackenzie: These are the exceptions and not the rules. Nicolas thank you we need to hear those stories of success because it gives us all hope.