Your Special Agent… in the Airport

For more than a decade, the Vnukovo Transportation Agency – a common initiative by the Vipservice Holding and Vnukovo International Airport – has been keeping a dominant position at the oldest air hub in Moscow. At the same time, Vipservice is developing its own sub-agent network of ticket offices in regional airports (Don Quixote LLC), as per the agreement with the Airports of Regions Holding. Evgeny Minyazev, CEO of the Vnukovo Transportation Agency and Don Quixote LLC, has described new tendencies in ticket office development and explained the benefits airline companies could obtain in collaboration with a reliable agency.

Evgeny, could you give us some more details on the airport projects the Vipservice Holding is working on?

The Vnukovo Transportation Agency is a company with State participation, a subsidiary of the Holding and Vnukovo Airport.  The airport needs a reliable agent to provide airline companies with high-level service. The airlines, in their turn, set great store by collaboration with the Vipservice Holding, since it is reputed to be a highly reliable player on the air ticket market. That is how the Vnukovo Transportation Agency appeared and got its dominant status within the airport area.

The Vnukovo Transportation Agency has concluded straightforward agreements with both Russian and foreign companies: Pobeda, Yakutia Airlines, Wizz Air, Nouvelair, Syrian Airlines, Cham Wings, Hong Kong Airlines, Saudia Airlines, Azerbaijan Airlines. Being their representative, we accept luggage fees and provide passengers with other services. We also act on behalf of Azimuth Airlines via the agreement with Vipservice.

At the same time, the Holding has concluded a fantastic agreement with the Airports of Regions: Don Quixote LLC, a strategic sub-agent of the Holding, became the only organisation authorized to sell tickets in the major regional airports on the same basis as airline offices. Interesting to mention that our offices are often located in much more advantageous positions, such as the check-in area, while the airline offices have to stay far from the main passenger traffic.

Don Quixote has its offices in the airports of Yekaterinburg, Samara, Nizhny Novgorod, Rostov-on-Don. In September, the company opened a new ticket agency in Novy Urengoy. Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky will also join us pretty soon. In spring 2019, Gagarin Airport in Saratov is expected to be put into service, and we will not squander such an opportunity.

What are your relations with the airline companies you represent? Why are they interested in such collaboration?

Sometimes the airlines feel it more advantageous to delegate some of their powers to a reliable representative. For instance, UTair has closed its office in Novy Urengoy providing us with the right to fee for extra luggage – and to execute some other services as well. We are busy with extra luggage check-in, transportation of animals, choose of more comfort seats. In Vnukovo, we have been acting on behalf of Yakutia Airlines for almost six months. In Platov, Koltsovo and Kurumoch we accept extra luggage fees for Aeroflot, Azur Air, Azimuth, FlyDubai, Uzbekistan Airways, I Fly, Ellinair.

Air ticket offices complain that increase in online sales lead to decline in revenue. How do you cope with that problem?

Obviously, it has been a difficult time for traditional ticket offices, with clients switching to online services and companies changing contractual obligations. In our offices, we have also noticed a decrease in sales, but we have responded in a timely way.  We have optimized our human resources and paperwork: for example, the Don Quixote regional offices, with all the documents and institutional issues, have been delegated to the Vnukovo Transportation Agency.

In addition to that, we provide passengers with more additional services: insurance, hotel rooms, bus tickets, etc. The bus tickets are mostly in demand in regions, while insurance products – luggage insurance, cancellation coverage, medical insurance for foreign trips – are popular all across the country. In Vnukovo, the insurance products are integrated into SOFI systems: passengers’ data are included automatically into the insurance policy, which makes the whole process faster and more reliable. One of my most immediate tasks is to implement the same service in the Don Quixote regional branches. We will start in December, in Novy Urengoy, where the specialists have already worked with some analogue of SOFI.

Do you offer online sale services?

We have established such a project with the Airports of Regions and Vnukovo: you can buy a ticket in the airport site, by using our online service. Since 2016, we have been using White Label by Biletix in our newly opened branches, while Vnukovo Airport had been connected to the system much earlier. Many clients find it more reliable to buy a ticket in the airport site. Which is a good decision, actually, because if any issue occurs, it is dealt with by the airport managers. We, on our side, support passengers as well.

What are other sources of income an airport ticket agency can benefit from?

There are plenty of them if the agency happens to be a Vipservice’s subsidiary :) We have been serving some large corporate clients, including Vnukovo Airport itself, the Paralympic Committee and several major gas producers. Our partner has successfully launched a capsule hotel in Vnukovo; now we are negotiating the same project with regional airports. Also, I find it interesting to try and launch something like the Flying Envelopes by S7 Company – a service for urgent documentation delivery. We are now discussing this prospective with our airline partners.

Reference:

Evgeny Minyazev

September 2018 – CEO at Don Quixote LLC, a Vipservice Holding branch

February 2017 – CEO at Vnukovo Transportation Agency LLC, a Vipservice Holding branch

November 2013 – Deputy CEO for Air Transportations at Regional Railroad Service Centres LLC, a Vipservice Holding branch

Education and qualification

•  International Law Academy in the Russian Ministry of Justice, lawyer

•  Courses on booking and selling in passenger air service with use of standard shipping documents at Sirena-Travel CJSC Automated Booking System, 2005