Travelport Resolve automates the sourcing and distribution of hotel rooms, air rebooking and meal and transport needs into a single experience when flight are cancelled or delayed. As a result, Travelport says passengers will no longer be frustrated standing in long lines at the airport waiting for paper hotel vouchers.

Meanwhile, the company claims airlines can react to disruptions with speed and accuracy, immediately communicating with passengers after an itinerary change so passengers can use their mobile device to quickly select and book their preferred hotel from available local accommodation options.

Being stranded at an airport is an airline passenger’s worst nightmare, according to Travelport. In the first six months of 2017 FlightStats data shows that almost one in five major airline flights within Europe (403,247 out of 2,075,208) suffered from some form of disruption. 

"But the real nightmare only begins once flights are cancelled. When flights are disrupted, passengers must scramble to find available rooms in local hotels. Passengers lucky enough to find rooms must then remain in the airport, standing in long lines, with a lack of real time communication, to wait for besieged airline employees to hand out paper vouchers that are required be presented at a hotel to obtain a room," the company said.

“With a few simple touches on their mobile device, Travelport helps disrupted passengers to bypass the frustration of hotel and meal voucher lines and quickly be on their way to a comfortable hotel room,” added Derek Sharp, Travelport’s senior-vice president and managing director, air commerce. “For airlines, Travelport Resolve helps carriers improve customer service performance during disruptions, avoiding serious damage to their brand and opportunities to build their relationships with affected customers.”

Travelport Resolve, which was developed from an idea generated in the Travelport Labs Accelerator programme, also provides airlines with actionable insights into disruptive irregular operations (IROPS) situations, including hotel-related costs, room usage, passenger status and activity patterns, with reporting tools that analyse the true cost of disruptions to an airline’s business and identify improvements an airline can make to its service. 

The product will soon include predictive features enabling airlines to recognise potential irregular operations/IROPS situations and local conditions or events that may create limited hotel availability. Travelport Resolve will then automatically procure room inventory needed to meet passenger demand.