Air China restores flagship store on Qunar in an ice-breaking move

ChinaTravelNews learned on June 13 that Air China, one of the “Big Three” state-owned carriers, has resumed its flagship store on the portal of major Chinese travel aggregator Qunar, but the carrier’s ticket agents have yet to resume listing their products on the booking website.

As a goodwill gesture for the restoration of Air China’s flagship store, Qunar has stopped its earlier stop-gap measure of grabbing links of the Air China fare offerings from its major shareholder Ctrip.com to fill the airfare gap.

Meanwhile, the other major airline companies such as China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines and Hainan Airlines have yet to resume their flagship stores or agent contents on Qunar.com.

China Southern Airlines and Hainan Airlines abruptly terminated their flagship store partnerships with Qunar on the last day of 2015. The move was followed by other Chinese carriers in a united front against the OTA. Then, Air China took the lead in March to bar its ticket agents from selling tickets on Qunar in a campaign to regulate the online marketplace for ticketing agents, and the other airline companies followed suit.

ChinaTravelNews reported on June 7 that eight Chinese airline companies decided to replace commission and rebate for domestic flights with a temporary agent-fee policy.