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GSA FEDERAL SUPPLY SERVICE: Top Ten Reasons to Use the GSA's Airline City Pair Program

Posted on: Tuesday, 2 August 2005, 12:00 CDT

1 PHENOMENAL SAVINGS

GSA has developed a world-class Airline City Pair Program (CPP) touted by industry as first-in-class of service and price. Serving Federal government agencies and Military organizations for over 25 years, the CPP has been instrumental in saving billions of dollars annually. What this means for the agency and travelers is that they can stretch those budget dollars (to do more with the dollars allocated) while saving the taxpayer's money. In addition to the tremendous price savings, the Airline City Pair Program has many features which allow government travelers all of the flexibility possible in planning official travel.

The business incentive for the airlines to offer greatly discounted fares is the award of all of the government's official travel for that city pair, hence the mandatory nature of the program. GSA leverages the government market share in exchange for great discounts on fares offering the benefits of flexibility. For this reason, once award is made, use of only that carrier for a city pair is required by all federal government travelers, unless a valid exception exists. Exceptions to the mandatory use requirement are contained in the Federal Travel Regulation (FTR 301-10.107) and those exceptions are listed below:

* Space or a scheduled contract flight is not available in time to accomplish the purpose of your travel, or use of contract service would require you to incur unnecessary overnight lodging costs which would increase the total cost of the trip; or

* The contractor's flight schedule is inconsistent with explicit policies of your federal department or agency with regard to scheduling travel during normal working hours; or

* A non-contract carrier offers a lower fare available to the general public, the use of which will result in a lower total trip cost to the Government or other mandatory users, to include the combined costs of transportation, lodging, meals, and related expenses. NOTE: This exception does not apply if the contract carrier offers comparable fare and has seats available at that fare, or if the lower fare offered by a noncontract carrier is restricted to government and military travelers on official business and many only be purchased with a GTR, contractor issued charge card, or centrally billed account.

* Rail service is available, and such service is cost effective and is consistent with mission requirements; or

* Smoking is permitted on the contract flight.

These fares are so attractive that everyone would like to use them! However, all of the major airlines have made it clear that, because the contract rates are so low and the terms so favorable to the government, the airlines would drop out of the Airline City Pair Program rather than extend the contract rates to contractors or personal use. Another reason contractors are not permitted to participate is that most contractor companies have their own corporate agreements with the airlines. For these reasons, the use of CPP fares is restricted to official government and military travel only, with an official form of payment. GSA SmartPay travel cards (VISA or MasterCard) are the forms of payment acceptable for contract city pair fares. In FY06, Government Transportation Requests (GTRs) are acceptable forms of payment for international travel, but, for domestic travel, only under special circumstances and for travel related expenses.

2 EVEN MORE PHENOMENAL SAVINGS

In over 2000 city pairs, there are two contract fares, also known as Dual Fares: a highly discounted unrestricted fare (called YCA fares or contract fares), and a capacity controlled fare (called dash CA (_CA) fares-where the can be any letter, such as D, Q, or K, etc.) with an even deeper discount. _CA fares have a limited number of seats, but no other restrictions. _CA availability varies carrier- bycarrier and market-by-market. To achieve greater savings for the government, travelers are encouraged to book reservations as early as possible. Once a traveler decides that a trip is necessary, the reservation should be made. The earlier the reservation, the better the chances are that the agency will receive the additional savings with the _CA fares. The following examples address how to best utilize this program and obtain even more phenomenal savings:

* Once a ticket has been issued, changes to your travel plans may result in your travel agent charging your agency an additional transaction fee, so if your travel plans are uncertain (e.g., last- minute ticket changes are likely), compare the differential between the YCA and _CA fares with the cost (if any) of your travel agent's transaction fee to reissue the ticket. If the differential is small, it may be more cost effective to book a YCA fare from the start. If the differential is large, it may be more beneficial to book a _CA fare and make changes, if necessary.

* If your travel plans are certain (e.g., attending a conference or training) or your travel schedule is flexible, then this is a perfect opportunity to get additional savings by asking for and booking a _CA fare. In FY05, the average differential between YCA and _CA fares is $87, but varies market-by-market. Your travel agent can assist you with scheduling.

3 BUDGET PROJECTION

With fares based on one-way travel, agency travelers may plan multiple destinations. Budgeting for travel is made easy since the fares will not change during a given contract year. Contract fares are awarded yearly and effective from October 1st through September 30th of each year.

4 SERVICE

The CPP team is sensitive to the government traveler's time away from home and realizes that price is not the only determinant factor in our frequently traveled markets. The CPP team takes into consideration a number of other travel scenarios in evaluating and awarding contracts to the airlines. The airlines submit their pricing based on competition and strength of schedule. Then, the CPP team reviews the submitted pricing on a number of best value determining factors prior to awardingincluding:

* A minimum service standard is set for each airline city pair. This minimum applies to the number of flights per day in each direction (the range is between two and six), a maximum of one connection, a maximum ground time of 90 minutes domestic, 180 minutes international and limits on circuity (how far out of the way the carrier can take the traveler to make connections).

* The value of the employee's time is a prime consideration-with departures from multiple airports servicing cities such as New York, Washington, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, and Los Angeles. These flight schedules place our travelers in closer proximity to their homes or TDY duty stations.

* Time and Type of Service: evaluates flights offered throughout the day. Nonstop service, at convenient times, scores best under this factor. The benefits of nonstop service for our high volume markets rates higher to minimize the possibility of delays or cancellation from connecting flights.

* Flight Time: looks for the shortest total flights based on each carriers routing. Nonstop service scores best under this factor.

* Number and Types of Flights: considers the number and frequency of flights offered throughout the day in order to provide the traveler with several choices. These include connections with carriers with nonstop flights scoring best under this factor.

* Jet Service: provides preference over propeller aircraft service.

All of these service factors are weighed against price, and a best value determination is made taking into consideration the best benefits available.

5 LAST SEAT AVAILABILITY

Airline City Pair fares offer last seat availability on the awarded carriers' planes for the routes they fly. This simply means that if there is a coach class seat available on their flight, you are able to get it. There are no advance purchase requirements or blackout periods, and if your travel dates change or meetings end early, you have the opportunity to get home earlier and save the government money.

6 FLEXIBILITY

Fares are unrestricted; no advance purchase and no minimum or maximum length of stay required. This flexibility allows for last minute travel essential particularly to the Military as well as Federal agencies involved with emergency and/or disaster relief.

7 FULLY REFUNDABLE

Tickets are fully refundable with no airline charges for cancellations or changes. Your travel agent can assist you in getting a refund on all unused or partially used tickets or trips.

8 FREQUENT FLYER MILES

Yes, you can participate in all of the airline's Frequent Flyer programs. To receive Frequent Flyer Mileage sign up with as many of the contract carriers as possible. But be careful-taking your favorite carrier to earn frequent flyer miles is not a valid excuse to not fly on the contract carrier! If there is a contract carrier for the market, you need to take it unless a valid exception applies!

9 INTEGRATION WITH TRAVEL SUPPLIERS

Airline City Pair fares are loaded in the airline's commercial reservation systems, making these fares available only through your agency's travel agent or travel management service such as the eTravel Service (eTS) or the DTS for purchase and management repor\ting. When booking you can be assured that you'll get the contract rates and services. In addition, in the event of any itinerary changes or emergency, your travel data will be available.

10 UP-TO-DATE INFORMATION

The website www.gsa.gov/citypairs contains the latest and most up- to-date information on contract fares and contract changes as well as providing origin/destination information for thousands of city pair markets awarded each year to help you plan and budget travel.

As airlines prepare offers and the GSA CPP Team evaluates and awards new contracts for the next fiscal year, you can be proud that you have saved billions in travel costs for the taxpayer by using the Airline City Pair Program. That's all you have to do! We'll do the rest.

We appreciate your support of the Airline City Pair Program-the Best Value in the Sky!

Copyright National Defense Transportation Association Aug 2005

Source: Defense Transportation Journal

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