NCAA, Travel Industry practitioners partner to stamp out fake agents with NTPIC
Barring last minute hitch, a new partnership that will stamp out touts and fraudsters’ in the nation’s travel industry especially at airports will be launched by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on behalf of the travel industry stakeholders and the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA).
The partners have agreed to unveil a mode of identification for genuine travel agencies and agents in the air travel sub-sector coming as a purpose-built identification card, called the Nigerian Travel Practitioners Identification Card (NTPIC).
The new card is part of the efforts to sanitise the industry by exposing illegal operators and fraudsters waiting to defraud intending passengers.
Business Hilights gathered that with effect from June 26, 2018, when the new travel agents identification scheme takes effect, it will become illegal for an unlicensed agent to sell tickets or members of the public to patronise such.
Besides, the NCAA 2006 Act designates the authority as the apex regulatory body of air travel in the country, including activities of the travel agencies that are the downstream sector of the aviation sector. It will be recalled that the air travel business has lately been faced with one-too-many cases of travel agents defrauding intending passengers and organisations in excess of millions of naira.
Explaining more on the new identity scheme, President of the National Association of Nigeria Travel Agencies (NANTA), Bankole Bernard, said the identification card measure is to assist intending air travellers to identify genuine travel agents from fake, and to put a stop to the activities of fraudsters’ in the sector.
According to him, “We decided to embark on this project as the downstream sector of the aviation industry. More so, the government does not really understand our worth or the total number of the agencies that exist within the country.
“Again, our industry is so porous; there is no exit or entry barrier. So, it has become an all-comers’ business even for fraudsters. Three, we realised that some have now used travel agencies as a means of human trafficking, defrauding intending passengers and as a means of bastarding our name at the embassies,” he said.
Currently, no fewer than 6000 travel agencies are registered with NANTA, out of which about 1000 have already applied for the NTPIC.
Vice president of NANTA, Lagos zone, Lola Adewole, said though fraud may not be completely eradicated in the industry, it can be reduced to the minimum.
