Paul Nunn, the Advantage Travel Partnership's chief operating officer, said the new payment portal will "mitigate merchant processing costs" and offers "a fresh, modern approach to payment collection."
Partnering with payment specialist Boodil, the new platform hopes to save both time and money for the Partnership and its members.
Members will be offered access to a fully white-label payment portal, streamlining payment collections using bank-to-bank money transfers via an accessible online platform. Despite being used widely in other sectors, the 'open banking' (bank-to-bank) model is relatively new to the travel industry.
Daily Singh, one of Boodil's co-founders, said the "core cloud-based product... make[s] collecting payments from customers easier and safer, offer[s] a solution which is cost-effective, and provide[s] a product that seamlessly integrates with any business."
Payments can be collected remotely without manual intervention or in person via a customer link or QR code.
An early adopter of the tech, Jake Cullum-Hollins of The Good Travel Agent, said the integration of Boodil's platform "revolutionised the way we collect customer payments," with the service now facilitating 60% of the agency's card transactions.
"My customers comment on how easy it is to make their payment and my team find it simple to manage the payment requests."
Jake is one of several early adopters as the platform begins a phased rollout across the Partnership.
Members will soon be able to access a suite of sustainability-centric tech and tools thanks to another partnership confirmed at the Advantage conference.
The Advantage Travel Partnership Conference is taking place from May 15th to 18th, 2024 at the Grand Palladium Costa Mujeres Resort & Spa in Cancun.
