Fox World Travel has been awarded a Travel Weekly Magellan Gold Award for innovation for their development of new unused ticket technology in response to COVID-19.  This marks the third consecutive year Fox has received honors from Travel Weekly and brings their total to four Magellan Awards. These awards fulfill Fox’s vision to change the travel industry through innovation and inspiration.

Unused Tickets: What You Need To Know & What You Can Do

Due to COVID-19, organizations’ unused ticket counts grew to historical levels. While unused ticket management has always been a standard TMC service to reduce dollars spent on air travel, the unprecedented volume of unused tickets created by COVID-19 made pushing industry norms to effectively use these tickets a necessity.

“After assessing the magnitude of the financial burden unused tickets could have on our clients, we had to find a way to help them not only quantify their risk, but create processes that would mitigate that risk,” said Fox Director of Travel Technology Jared Bachman. “We left no stone unturned for our clients.”

Standard unused ticket tracking and airline waiver identification have always been part of the expectations of a TMC, but solving new challenges with solutions that increase efficiency and accuracy is where Fox shines. Fox’s innovative new integration of unused ticket and waiver technology brings clients relief and unmatched savings.

Online booking tool limitations surrounding unused ticket and waiver application was no longer acceptable given the vast amount of tickets clients had on file. Fox solved for this by developing a custom airline waiver table to pair with their best-in-class ticket tracking platform to automate the utilization of unused tickets for those booking online. The table automatically matches bookings with the appropriate waivers, eliminating the need to call for agent aid and pay a service fee. The custom table has also been adapted by Fox’s frontline agents, ensuring the same increased accuracy and efficiency regardless of booking method.

“We anticipated about 15 minutes of time savings per exchange since waiver information is right in front of them, also reducing the need to call the airlines,” said Alisha Lembke, Fox director of business travel operations.

Fox is also leading the industry with a new process that identifies refund opportunities on previously non-refundable tickets. In instances where travelers cancelled non-refundable flights with segments the airline ultimately cancelled or significantly delayed, Fox’s solution identifies which tickets the airline switched to refundable and processes that refund for the customer. This puts money back in clients’ pockets instead of having their corporate funds tied up in unused tickets inventory.

Unused Tickets: The Fox Difference

“I am constantly energized by our team of talented associates at Fox,” said Fox CIO Sam Hilgendorf. “We have created a culture that thrives on developing better experiences for our clients. With the initial launch of this solution, we have already saved nearly 3,000 unused tickets, leading to a recovery value of over $1.7MM. This is something both our organization and our clients can be extremely proud of.”

Fox’s solutions were developed in-house by their award-winning technology team. At a time when unused ticket management and cost savings are a priority for many, Fox has revolutionized the unused ticket process to give clients an invaluable experience and help them come out of COVID-19 stronger than ever.

The Magellan Awards are judged and overseen by a one-of-a-kind panel of top travel professionals representing the best names and most accomplished leaders from the industry.

The Magellan Awards honor outstanding services in a broad range of industry segments including hospitality, travel destinations, cruise lines, online travel services, airlines and airports, travel agents and agencies, tour operators and ground transportation.

For a complete list of silver and gold winners, please visit travelweeklyawards.com

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