Delta and NW/KLM are aligning their US based GDS policies on abusive practices. As the Transatlantic Alliance between Air France Group and Delta Group slowly comes to fruition we are seeing some aligning of their policies with regard to GDSs, Travel Agencies and ARC/BSP.
http://www.traveldailynews.com/pages/show_page/30194
What we have yet to see is the alignment for the next generation of activity with the imposition of selective GDS pullouts or penalties as we have seen in Germany with Lufthansa Group against Amadeus and France+Benelux for pure AF Group against Galileo.
Thus it is conceivable for an agent in Amsterdam to book a flight on KLM metal but the booking made on Northwest without incurring the GDS surcharge imposed by KLM there. With Travelport picking up the tab for the near term - we will likely see as in Germany no change in Agent booking behavior. However I do know that many agents are re-thinking their GDS strategies as a result of this new behavior by the airlines.
It sure makes for an interesting marketplace.
Cheers
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