Requests for assistance for airline passengers with intellectual disabilities have nearly doubled since the launch of the Travel Unified global campaign by travel technology company, Travelport. The campaign drives awareness about DPNA (disabled passenger with intellectual or developmental disability needing assistance) as a Special Service Request (SSR) code available in the airline industry for passengers.
In India, the use of the code for flights booked through Travelport has increased by 165%.Travelport launched its Travel Unified campaign in March 2019 after it found evidence of exceptionally low use of the code on bookings made through its global distribution system (GDS).
A poll of travel agents and conversations with non – profit organizations confirmed this was due a lack of awareness. Since the launch of Travel Unified, use of the DPNA SSR code on flights booked through Travelport has increased globally by 89% year – on – year. At a regional level, use of the code on flights is now up 273% in Asia, 259% in Africa, 94% in Europe and 22% in Oceania. Use remains low in both North and South America.
As part of its campaign to raise awareness of the DPNA SSR code, Travelport has shared educational ‘sign-on-alerts’ and graphical ‘prompts’ more than 10 million times with hundreds of thousands of travel agents across the world through Travelport Smartpoint, its flagship Point of Sale solution that is used by travel agents, among others, to search and book airline seats, hotel rooms and more.
The digital media used to reach travel agents is typically sold by Travelport to travel providers, like airlines and hotels, as advertising space.
In addition, Emirati vlogger, Khalid Al Ameri , documented his family’s positive experience traveling from the United Arab Emirates to Bahrain on a flight with Etihad Airways, with the DPNA SSR code applied to the booking of his son, who is on the autism spectrum. Since the video went live on Al Ameri’s Facebook page on World Autism Day, it has been viewed more than 6 million times, shared more than 100,000 times and received more than 10,000 messages of support.
Fiona Shanley, Chief Customer and Marketing Officer at Travelport, said: “Our purpose as a company is to build leading technology that makes the experience of buying and managing travel continually better for everyone, so raising awareness of the support available for travelers with different needs is something we all are passionate about. We’re encouraged by the results we’ve seen so far and our decision to extend Travel Unified until at least the end of 2019 should enable us to reach even more travelers and travel agents.
“We ’d like to call on all airlines, airports, hotels and other members of the travel family to do more to ensure everyone has the travel experience they deserve, including the 200 million people worldwide with intellectual disabilities,” added Shanley.
Linda Ristagno, External Affairs Manager at IATA, said: “Air travel is an integral means of transport in today’s world and all those with disabilities – visible or not – should have access to safe, reliable and dignified travel.
