The International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced it signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the International Union of Railways (UIC), to strengthen their cooperation in standard setting and interoperability initiatives, with a focus on data exchange standards supporting intermodal travel. 

Under the MoU, the collaboration opportunities will be explored from the dual perspectives of existing distribution processes and standards as well as transformative retail-based “offer-order” processes and standards, typified by the New Distribution Capability and ONE Order initiatives. These activities offer significant opportunity for value-creation within intermodal partnerships.

Specific areas for dialogue and cooperation around standards and interoperability include:

• Journey planning and shopping
• Reservations and servicing 
• Ticketing, including irregular operations processes
• Industry coding, including location codes
• Check-in and validation control
• Accounting and settlement
• Legal aspects

“For 75 years, IATA’s mission has included supporting and facilitating the development of the commercial standards that enable the smooth and efficient operation of a globally inter-connected air transport network. As customers increasingly seek sustainable travel options, it is important that providers work together to provide seamless exchanges of passengers and passenger information. IATA has extensive experience in facilitating standards development to support intramodality and our MoU with UIC is an important step toward strengthening this activity,” said IATA’s Director General and CEO, Alexandre de Juniac.

François Davenne, UIC Director General, said, “This MoU confirms the desire to really promote multimodality. Offering customers a single ticket for rail and air travel gives them the opportunity to choose the best of both worlds by optimising their journey as well as their carbon footprint. In addition, both IATA and UIC are currently developing tomorrow’s digital standards for ticketing applications: to work on established interfaces right from the design phase is an exciting prospect.”