Abu Dhabi: Etihad Airways is going for a full changeover of its Amadeus passenger services system to Sabre airline solutions from Sunday as the new system — SabreSonic platform — is much more integrated.
Etihad Airways signed an 11-year deal with Sabre on December 21, 2011, valued at $1 billion (Dh3.67 billion).
“We are fully prepared and have studied carefully many other airlines’ cutovers. We are changing our website, reservations systems, inventory systems, check-in systems and the ways in which they work with the corporate back office,” Gordon Penfold, Senior Vice-President of Information Technology at Etihad Airways, told Gulf News.
He said the system goes off sales from Friday [February 22] and is expected to resume on Sunday [February 24].
The sales offices and call centres will come back online from Saturday at 6pm. The airports will be using the new system for departures leaving after 11pm on Saturday. Everything should be fully functional by Sunday 5am.
Passengers travelling during the transition period are asked to arrive at the airport four hours before departure.
Passengers wishing to change their bookings should do that before Friday, and no new bookings “will be possible on Saturday”.
“We have a phased roll-out of the new systems across our operations worldwide. Abu Dhabi and 22 airports around the world will be rolled out at the same time as the Sales and Website changes. There are a further five phases of roll-out in different regions and everything will be completed before March 31,” he said.
Around 34,000 passengers fly on each of these days and “which is our normal traffic during weekends,” he said.
“We have increased our staff during these days and more people will be on duty at our call centres and at the airport. The benefits of the new platform are enhanced guest experience, increased efficiency and streamlined work processes.”
