In addition to reestablishing interline ties with Biman Bangladesh, Air Seychelles (HM), and ITA Airways, Etihad Airways has started reciprocal interline partnerships with three new airline partners: Philippine Airlines (PAL), Austrian Airlines (OS), and Airlink South Africa (4Z) (AZ). Customers of all participating airlines will benefit from improved connectivity to locations on each other's networks, the ability to book on a single ticket, and the ability to check in only once at the beginning of their journey, with their baggage being checked through to their final destination.
Etihad's Chief Revenue Officer, Arik De, stated: "Broadening our network reach and making Abu Dhabi more accessible to travelers has always driven our aim. The six interline/code agreements make life simpler for passengers on all participating airlines. With Austrian Airlines, we now have interline or codeshare agreements with the other four Lufthansa Group members, providing our customers with access to up to 58 European destinations via Vienna, which is serviced by Etihad daily during the summer. In addition to our existing choices with South African Airlines, our agreement with Airlink South Africa provides connecting passengers on our aircraft from Johannesburg with seamless access to 25 regional African destinations as well as 16 internal South African destinations.
For the significant Filipino diaspora residing in the UAE, "and joining up with Philippine Airlines enables simple access to 19 domestic Filipino destinations including Cebu, Cagayan de Oro, Davao, and Kalibo, to and from Etihad's double daily Manila service," De added. We're happy to reconnect with Biman and Air Seychelles in order to supplement our own Dhaka and Mahe flights and provide more destinations, such Chittagong and Praslin. Our connections with those airlines were hampered by those companies' own system migrations over the past 12 months. Following ITA's own Amadeus Altea migration in February, Etihad's excellent collaboration with ITA Airways over Rome Fiumicino to Italy, Europe, and beyond has also been re-established.
During the next few weeks, Etihad will gradually roll out the increased interline and codeshare options across all of its sales channels, including travel agencies and Etihad.com.