Air Deccan offers e-ticketing via SBI

Low-cost airliner Air Deccan on Tuesday announced its tie-up with the State Bank of India (SBI) to offer online ticketing.

The online facility will be available to SBI customers who have signed up for internet banking.

SBI has 3,500 internet banking branches across the nation. Air Deccan and SBI signed a memorandum of understanding to enable the facility. Air Deccan already offers online ticket booking facility through Citibank and ICICI Bank.

"Travellers from the North East region, Jammu & Kashmir and Andaman & Nicobar Islands are experiencing problems in procuring tickets since credit penetration in these areas is low. There is a demand that tickets be offered through banks. Consequently, we are entering into an agreement with the SBI, the country's largest commercial bank," Deccan Aviation managing director G R Gopinath told reporters here.

SBI customers can long on to www.airdeccan.net and complete the travel transaction with confirmations. The payment options are through a direct debit to the SBI account.

"The transactions are safe and digitally encrypted. SBI will charge 1 per cent of the ticket fare as commission for every transaction," SBI chairman T S Bhattacharya added.

At present, the online ticket booking facility is available only to SBI customers. This facility will be extended to customers of SBI-affiliated banks shortly.

Air Deccan, which flies to 55 destinations, will launch services to Kulu, Dharmsala and Ludhiana in the coming days.

"We are the largest e-commerce site in the country with a majority of the tickets being sold online. The aim is to carry 8 million passengers this year as against our average 6 million," Gopinath stated.