Travel management technology provider TripStax has added two new modules to its offerings: a quality control module not based on passenger name records and a new-look hotel booking module.
The quality control module works via APIs and outside of the global distribution systems, integrating booking data from TripStax's data-processing Core system. This eliminates the need to code non-GDS bookings back into the PNR, a process TripStax said requires "time-consuming and outdated workflows". The module then can check control data sets and get corrections in place, either automatically if it applies to certain rules or by alerting an agent.
TripStax chief strategy officer David Chappell said TMCs have shown a "huge interest" in the QC module, especially in North America, as there is a greater need to manage bookings outside of GDSs.
"TripStax is not saying that we are anti-GDS," said Chappell. "The GDS platforms are immensely efficient distributors. But in a world where bookings are now created via a multitude of content sources, it is no longer scalable for TMCs to rely on a system that can only process PNRs for quality control."
The Hotels module, meanwhile is built from the integration of the Hotelzon booking platform, which TripStax acquired from Travelport last year and said in June that it would rebrand it.
TripStax has given the platform new log-in, search, navigation and results pages and integrated it within the Core, meaning hotel booking data can be pulled into other modules that TMCs are using, such as Track for driving duty-of-care compliance or Analytics to provide data on hotel spending and behaviours.
The Hotels module also adds "significant hotel content" to TripStax's Content module, which previously was limited to air content from both GDS and non-GDS air providers.
"The new transformative [user interface] is just the first stage in our evolution of the platform," said TripStax CEO Jack Ramsey. "Over the next 12 months, we will go through a process of re-engineering the functionality and user experience to ensure TripStax Hotels is future-proofed as a next-generation hotel booking tool for our TMC clients and their corporate customers."
Ramsey told BTN Europe that the company intends to develop a "neutral booking tool offering content parity that will deliver the same experience for both agents and travellers online and offline". The Quality Control and Hotels modules are a "toe in the water in this respect", added Ramsey.
TripStax launched in 2022 as a spinoff of TMC ATPI, making its technology available to TMCs, corporate customers and other technology providers in the form of modules connected to the Core central data processing system.