Implementation

FareNet Implementation

The FareNet Pixel is mapped to available elements in the airline’s booking engine and collects flight results from every search

*This section is usually reviewed and completed by: Pricing, Revenue Management, and/or Technical Liaison of Booking Engine

FareNet is the proprietary technology underlying PROS products which converts fare and flight search data into valuable conversion-oriented content using a single line of JavaScript code. The pixel is implemented and fired into the Fare Search Results Page using a Custom HTML Tag in a Tag Management System. FareNet enables PROS to ‘recycle’ fare and flight data from the searches that website visitors are already doing.

Importantly, because the pixel only activates after a visitor has already arrived on the Flight Results Page and the page elements have loaded, FareNet does not add any stress to servers, affect page

load time, scrapes data, or require additional booking database resources (server calls or GDS calls).

Absolutely no personally identifiable information of site visitors is collected or stored at any time. FareNet only collects flight and fare information already available to any user searching for a flight.

This flight and fare data is leveraged to power airTRFX, airModules, airWire, airSEM, and other PROS products. This allows the system to deliver fresh content and fare information that is relevant to both customers and search engines.

Data collected by FareNet

Data points that may be captured and later used to power content modules can include the following:

Origin Airport Code

Destination Airport Code

Departure Price

Return Price

Departure Date

Return Date

Fare Class

Currency

Search Date

Departure Time

Return Time

Flight Duration

Connections

Trip Carrier Number(s)

Operated By Information

Data Collection Methods

The FareNet script can be built to collect the data in a variety of ways, but the DataLayer method is preferred as it provides more stability than the other approaches.

Option 1: Targeting DataLayer (Preferred)

PROS will work with the customer to utilize existing DataLayer variables, or implement new variables, that return the required flight search data for airTRFX.

This method is preferred as the DataLayer is typically a more stable data source and should not be affected by UI/UX changes to the customer booking engine.

Option 2: Fare Notification endpoint

In this method is customers have ability to send the required parameters via an API. A unique endpoint is provided for each customer by PROS. Customers have the ability to post the information to the endpoint and requires credentials to access. This endpoint is used to post pricing data as real-time user searches are happening on the Booking Engine. This ensures we have real-time pricing data for the routes and dates users are searching for, as well as popularity data for the routes.

Option 3: Targeting HTML Elements

If a DataLayer is not available, PROS will target the data using HTML elements from the source code of the page(s).

If this method is used, PROS will require access to a staging environment and proactive communication from the customer any time a change to the source code of the targeted page(s) is anticipated, in order to build and test before production deployment.

Option 4: Hybrid Data Layer/HTML Targeting

In the case of the customer having a partial DataLayer, a hybrid method can be utilized.

FareNet Development Considerations

Fare Type to Display

The Customer will need to decide to display one-way fares, round-trip fares, or a combination of both (currently the only combination setting allows international fares to display round-trip and domestic fares to display one-way) on the airTRFX pages.

Price Combinability

If the Customer decides to display any round-trip fares on the airTRFX pages, PROS will need to understand the combinability logic of leg-based fares.

If any Outbound leg fares can be combined with any Inbound leg fare for a given route for the same departure and return dates, then we consider the pricing logic to be combinable. Combinable pricing means that for every user search, PROS can collect multiple combinations of the price for a given route for the same departure and return dates and will therefore have more data to display.

If the Inbound leg fare changes depending on the Outbound leg selected by the user for a given route on a given day, then we consider this logic to be non-combinable.

Discounted (Non-public) Fares

To avoid displaying discounted fares on the airTRFX pages, it is important to ensure the FareNet script is only firing on the public-facing booking engine. There are additional considerations to avoid collecting and displaying discounted fares:

Employee booking portals
Promo code fare discounts
Points Redemption booking engines

Currency to Display

To maintain consistency in the user experience from airTRFX pages to the Customer’s booking engine, it is necessary to understand the currency display logic. Most customers display currency based on Point of Origin or Point of Sale. airTRFX has built-in settings to accommodate both of these logics.

FareNet Hosting

FareNet is hosted and cached using Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud storage services. AWS is highly secure, scalable, expandable, and load-balanced to exceed the airline website’s traffic requirements.

AWS provides security features that are designed and managed in alignment with best security practices and a variety of IT security standards, including the following:

SOC 1/SSAE 16/ISAE 3402 (formerly
SAS 70 Type II)
SOC2, SOC3
FISMA, DIACAP, and FedRAMP
PCIDSSLevel1
ISO27001
ITAR, FIPS140-2

AWS security features*:

Built-in Firewall
Encryption (TLS) across all services
DDoS mitigation technologies
Man in the Middle Prevention
Traffic flow policies (ACLs)

Additional Security Measures

To ensure stability and protect valuable client information, PROS also executes additional security protocol:

Penetration tests are performed by a third-party every six months
Access to production administration interfaces are reviewed every 90 days
Load balancers are the only public endpoints
Communication between private networks and data centers conducted over SSL and through IP filtering
Transmission between the airline site of data conducted over SSL.

Only a limited set of data is captured, transmitted and stored in the database; including fare, cabin, origin, destination, dates and currency.

Absolutely no personally identifiable information of site visitors is captured or stored at any time.

*In the November 2014 report: The Forrester Wave^TM: Public Cloud Service Providers’ Security, Q4 2014, Forrester named AWS as the only Leader in public cloud security. Specifically, the report cites AWS’ capabilities in data center security, certifications, and network security; as well as excelling in customer satisfaction, security services partnerships, and a large installed base.

Implementation Sections:

Welcome Page

FareNet
Implementation

Flight Search Panel

Airports Source

Deeplinks

Design System

Hosting

Business Insights Surveys