BEFORE entering the Middle East market it was important for us to specialise in destinations frequented by Middle Eastern travellers, explains Prakash Bang, managing director, roomsXML.com. “We always need to answer four questions before entering new markets: Are the hotels and apartments offered optimised for that market? Are the rates highly competitive? Is the staff in place to support travel agents 24x7? Can we accept payments in local currency? Now that we have all this in place, we’re ready to launch our services in the Middle East.”
roomsXML Solutions Limited is a business to business initiative providing accommodation booking services to the travel trade, including agents and portals. The product optimises room availability and price, based on the parameters selected by the user – the supplier with the lowest price gets the booking. Thus, by signing up with roomsXML, travel agents and portals access global and local suppliers without the hassle of maintaining multiple accounts and the need to invest in high-end technology. At the time of going to press, roomsXML offers over 79,000 unique properties across the world.The company has a highly skilled team dedicated to scan every hotel/apartment supplied by multiple suppliers. A combination of proprietary software and human intervention assures that all duplicates are removed. “We have resolved the duplication issue for 999 out of 1000 hotels/apartments,” says Bang. “And we do reward the travel agent by crediting their account by $5 for every duplicate hotel that they find in our system. As per our market intelligence and client feedback, we are the only multiple-supplier system that has been successful in addressing the issue of de-duplication.”Apart from de-duplication of inventory, roomsXML offers many firsts:Made to order XML feed: “While we can provide an XML feed to travel portals incorporating the entire roomsXML inventory, we can also offer destination or product specific inventory. For example, a travel portal may need XML feed for only South East Asia or only apartments or only luxury properties,” says Bang.Quotation generator: This is a first in the industry. Branded Q-Push, this feature helps the travel agent to submit quotations with property images and information via email directly from the roomsXML booking panel. There’s no need for the travel agent to spend time in preparing accommodation proposals manually. What’s more, the travel agent has the option to send the quote with the mark-up included. Retail interface: This is the first in the industry and still the only one. Branded Retina – it’s a retail interface that allows the travel agent to confidently flip the screen to face their customers. With one click, the screen changes to show the travel agent’s logo and also display the rates with a pre-set mark-up. The rates seen by the customer will include travel agent margins. The mark-up returns to zero at log out. When the next customer walks in, it starts all over again with a new mark-up intended for that customer.Online CRM: Also the first in the industry. Thousands of dollars have gone in presenting an online customer relationship management (CRM) system. At the click of a button the travel agent can submit special requests, booking modifications, general queries without the need to email the support team. A ticket number ensures that a query remains on alert until resolved. Preferred by Agents: This industry-first feature removes the guesswork while selecting and booking a hotel. “We call it ‘Preferred by Agents’. Only those properties would become ‘Preferred’ if a minimum of 10 travel agents nominate that property. The ranking of the property goes up as more and more unique agents prefer that property. For a travel agent it’s like getting a reference from fellow agents, making it more dependable. Map-view search: This feature makes it easy for the travel agent to search and view properties on an interactive map, based on location and budget. Local currency commitment: With this facility, the travel agent can mitigate the currency exchange risk and reduce their accounting workload by paying in currency of their choice for worldwide hotel bookings. “Our global banking network makes it easy for Australian agents to pay in Australian dollars, Indian agents in rupees, Saudi Arabian agents in riyals and so on.” The price of confirmed bookings don’t change with fluctuating exchange rates. Hence, the travel agent’s margins are well protected.Business to consumer widget: Branded FRAME, this widget can sit on the travel agent’s website whereby their customers will be able to view the entire roomsXML inventory in real time and at rates that include the travel agent’s mark-ups. With FRAME the travel agent can instantly convert their website into an active, money-making initiative. Innovative 100 recognises 100 trailblazer mid-sized companies ($10 million to $250 million) whose ideas, approaches and tools are fresh. They’re bold, unconventional and disruptive with a potential to revolutionise the business world. Innovative 100 captures the role of mid-sized business community in the innovation journey that have demonstrated a flair for impactful innovation.The ISO certification recognises roomsXML’s quality management systems. The certification was done by BM TRADA, world’s leading quality certification body based in UK. roomsXML is the first company in the world to get the Certification in the category it represents.