TAFI starts credit facility

The Western Chapter of Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI) has taken its joint bank guarantee scheme with IATA and replicated it for hotels.

Hazel Jain

The Western India Chapter of the Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI) has become the first association chapter to initiate a joint bank guarantee scheme for hotels for its members. It has started the pilot project with IHCL (India Hotels Company Limited). Abbas Moiz, Chairman, TAFI (Western India), said, “TAFI has signed an agreement for credit facility for small and mid-sized agents on the lines of a joint bank guarantee arrangement. Mid-sized agents will be able to get credit from IHCL for their domestic hotels for booking of up to eight rooms. This is a pilot that IHCL is running with the Western Indian Chapter of TAFI. It could be a new stream of income or business for agents. It is like getting recognition directly from the hotel rather than going through a third party aggregators or online portals. You are now getting a chance to create an identity for yourself and building a relationship with them with a good arrangement and at a good price.”

There are three slabs of two lakhs, five lakhs and 10 lakhs of which 50 per cent is to be deposited with TAFI. The association will use it to create a bank guarantee for IHCL.

Rajat Bagaria, Joint Secretary, TAFI, has been working on this pilot since day one. He says, “TAFI has actually mastered the joint bank guarantee scheme with the airlines. Taking a cue from that, we thought this was the next way forward. Having done this with IHCL, we may look at other hotel chains as well – Indian or international.