FAQ

HitchHiker is a technology provider, not a consolidator, and therefore does not offer commission on flight sales.

Our role is to bring together and facilitate the booking of flight content from different channels such as GDS, airline interfaces and third-party providers. This includes low-cost content that is not or not fully available through the traditional GDS.

As an agency, you can add your own service charge to the respective fare and charge it to the end customer.

Because we only use your own PCC or Office ID for GDS bookings, your segment credits remain with you.

When using our NDC connections, you also save the GDS surcharges (DCC) charged by some airlines.

Yes, you can either add them yourself when programming our interface or use our Calculation Engine.

The Calculation Engine will become available with Flight API version 4.1 and allows you to flexibly manage and adjust your service fees for different airlines, sales channels or company divisions via a comfortable user interface.

Yes, this is possible.

In order to make you a concrete offer, we need precise information about which airlines and routes you require.

Most low-cost airlines do not require separate contracts to book.

However, some low-cost airlines as well as all scheduled airlines, consolidators except BERlogic, and GDS require a separate contract with the respective supplier. These are marked with an asterisk on our HitchHiker Flight Content list.

We will be happy to establish the contact to our partners for you.

For agencies without their own IATA license, we work together with various wholesalers, including AERTiCKET and BERlogic in Germany, as well as other international providers in China, South America and Asia.

A current list of all connected consolidators can be found in the wholesaler overview.

You are also welcome to provide the PCC or Office ID of a different fulfillment partner you would like to work with for your flight bookings.

Please also note that booking our low-cost airlines does not require an IATA license.

Since many of our customers already work with their own payment service providers in other areas, you are free to choose your PSP in this area as well.

For start-ups in the online business, we are happy to recommend cooperation with Wirecard or Stripe.

You can reach our support team Monday to Friday from 09:00 am to 06:00 pm, except on German public holidays, by e-mail at support@hitchhiker.net or by phone at +49 69 507030.

Please note that sending e-mails to support@hitchhiker.net requires prior authorization from our support team. Please provide us with the name and e-mail address of all employees who will send support requests in the future. This notification can be made via your responsible sales representative, via an authorized colleague or by phone through our support hotline.

If you have sent an inquiry to support@hitchhiker.net, you will receive an automatic acknowledgement of receipt and a ticket number such as HHSUP-1234. For further messages about the same case, please make sure that this ticket number is included in the subject line. If you have several questions or problems, please send them as separate requests.

Please always include the corresponding Transaction ID, also called TID, as well as a detailed description of the problem and the expected result.

Please also let us know if it is a business-critical incident so that we can prioritize it.

Our sales department will be happy to provide you with a test tool for queries and test bookings on our Flight API.

Instructions for the test tool can be downloaded in the test tool manual.

During implementation, our test tool is also a useful resource for your developers because they can use it not only for testing, but also to generate complete SOAP requests and responses.

You can download a checklist for the process of a Flight API project in the Flight API Integration Checklist.

In addition to GDS payment methods, we also support payment by credit card, virtual credit card, agency collection, agency deposit and electronic banking such as SEPA.

Which payment method is supported by the respective low-cost airlines can be accessed via the API command GetPaymentMethods.

The cost of our system depends on your individual requirements and the planned booking and transaction volume.

Our sales department will be happy to advise you and provide you with a current price list.

Contact us directly at sales@hitchhiker.net or +49 69 507030 to receive a non-binding quotation.

We have decided not to make it publicly available and therefore ask you to request it via our chat or via our contact page.

A complete and always up-to-date list can be downloaded under the following link: HitchHiker Flight Content.

Even if our interface neutralizes the different formats of our suppliers, the scope of functions is different for each airline and supplier.

A detailed list of the supported functionalities can be found here: Airline Function List.

Information about new releases can be found on the following page: http://releasenotes.hitchhiker.com.

You can view information about current changes to our airline plug-ins here: http://lccstatus.hitchhiker.com.

Critical incidents and downtimes reported by our GDS partners can be found here: http://cim.hitchhiker.com.

Please register on the respective pages to be informed about changes by e-mail.

There are many good reasons to choose HitchHiker as your flight technology provider. Here are the four most important ones.

Experience: HitchHiker looks back on 28 years of experience in developing software solutions for the travel industry. During this time we have developed a very broad spectrum of solutions and tools for selling flights and automating internal processes.

Content: HitchHiker gives you access to one of the most comprehensive flight content portfolios in the world. This includes connections to 6 GDS, more than 120 low-cost and scheduled airlines, and well-known wholesalers. This saves you considerable time and money compared to connecting and maintaining individual interfaces.

NDC capability: We say yes to the new industry standard and already provide certified access to around 20 NDC airlines. This means you can benefit from exclusive fare offers and additional services, branded fares and incentives, or save up to EUR 11 per segment on GDS fees charged by some airlines.

Service: In addition to hosting the system in a modern, secure and scalable hosting center, we are also happy to take on individual development orders for our customers. During implementation and operation, our friendly and competent support team is always at your side with help and advice.