Cleartrip Rebuilds Booking Tool From Scratch

25.08.2023 - 13:32 / skift.com / Thomas Cook / Amrita Ghosh / Campbell Wilson / Air India

Getting its first overhaul in 14 years, online travel agency Cleartrip unveiled a revamped version of its booking tool for agents. With what Cleartrip describes as a user-friendly design and round-the-clock support center, AgentBox 2.0 enables travel agents to book over 100 airlines, more than 500,000 hotels, exclusive holiday packages, group bookings, and meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions. “While the earlier version, first introduced in 2009, was more about making agents familiar with online adoption, the upgraded tool focuses heavily on the backend stack, offering a suite of products including flights, hotels, packages, buses and trains,” said Sukesh Shetty, head of B2B at Cleartrip. One of the reasons why the tool was never upgraded after 2009, he said, was because the company was so extensively concentrated on business-to-consumer that business-to-business was just an ancillary product for Cleartrip. “We want to be a catalyst in agents’ growth and not just another platform provider,” Shetty added. Additionally, Cleartrip registered 70 percent growth in monthly agent transactions and onboarded over 5,000 agents in the financial year 2022. The company also reported a 200 percent surge in summer travel bookings compared to the same period last year.

Tata Group-owned Air India reduced the number of days retiring employees can accumulate for privilege leaves in the current and next financial years. In an internal communication to employees, the airline’s CEO and Managing Director Campbell Wilson said all such leaves beyond 60 days would be encashed for staff approaching retirement. In March, the airline revised its policy, setting the accumulation limit of 60 days for all employees in a particular financial year from April 1. The airline previously allowed permanent employees to accumulate or encash up to 300 privilege leaves. Earlier this month, Air India extended the last date to apply for voluntary retirement offers for its employees till May 31 from April 30, 2023.

Indian hospitality brand Pride Hotels Group launched a 65-room Pride Biznotel Whitefield, Bengaluru in the south Indian state of Karnataka. “Expanding our Pride Biznotel brand to multiple locations is a testament to our commitment to meeting the discerning needs of business travelers,” said Satyen Jain, CEO of Pride Hotels. The hotel is the group’s second property in the city after Pride Hotel Bengaluru, located at Richmond Road. Earlier this month, the brand announced the signing of Pride Resort Ambajiin the western state of Gujarat, and the launch of Pride Resort Rudraprayagin the north Indian state of Uttarakhand. 

Low-cost carrier IndiGo’s first widebody aircraft landed in New Delhi, showcasing its white and blue