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NDC Distribution Shopping Exchange

Air
Pricing
REST API
Travel Agency

What is it?

The New Distribution Capability (NDC) Distribution Shopping Exchange API initiates the exchange shopping process based on an existing, fulfilled order. The response provides alternative itineraries and prices that the ticket may be exchanged for. Differential pricing information is also returned, containing any penalty fees that may apply.

Why use it?

Search for alternative itineraries and pricing options against a fulfilled order, which is the first step in the voluntary change process for NDC itineraries/orders.

NDC Distribution Shopping Exchange includes the following options:

  • Outbound flight only (for round trips)
  • Inbound flight only (for round trips)
  • All flights
  • Routing
  • Dates
  • Cabin
  • Booking class (does not shop by booking class)

The full process is performed by using this API combined with the Order Management API.

NDC Distribution Shopping Exchange:

  1. Use the /reshop/shop endpoint to reshop an existing itinerary or order based on new search criteria.
  2. For carriers that employ the two-step exchange process, use the /reshop/price endpoint to price an offer from the reshop response to calculate the details needed for the Order part of the flow.
  3. Change an existing order based on the reshop response.

Order Management:

  1. Use the orders/change endpoint to modify the itinerary.
  2. Send a request with the modified itinerary to orders/change to exchange the ticket with payment information and settle any differentials (additional collection\penalty fees) with the airline.

Refer to the How It Works section below for more information.

How it works

Prerequisites

  • The airline must support exchanges
  • The modification of outbound/inbound/all flights, routing, dates, cabin, booking class must be allowed
  • Familiarity with Sabre Order/Reshop API specification, and the steps within the Order/Reshop workflow
  • NDC Distribution Shopping Exchange requires:
    • Sabre Order ID
    • Origin and destination
    • Dates of travel
    • Indicators for the segments to be retained (if any)

Process

This API performs several steps to shop for new eligible offers based on an existing ticket in an NDC order:

  1. Authorize.
  2. Using carrier functionality configurations, validates if the exchange shopping request is valid.
  3. Retrieves order data.
  4. Retrieves offer data.
  5. Retrieves shopping exchange configuration.
  6. Creates a final configuration based on the exchange and shopping settings.
  7. Builds and sends a request to the airline via IATA's NDC Order/Reshop API.
  8. Creates and stores offers based on the response from IATA's NDC Order/Reshop API. The airline response includes multiple offers that are written to the Sabre Offer Store. These offers have a time-to-live returned in the response.
  9. Builds and sends an exchange shopping response to the customer with a differential calculated by the airline against items that the order contains.
  10. If the agent decides to continue with the change, then the Offer Item ID(s) must be included in a request to the orders/change/exchange endpoint using Sabre's Order Management API.

Notes:

  • This API supports both one-step and two-step Order/Reshop functionality.
  • Suppliers expose IATA's NDC Order/Reshop API which should in the first step return one or more offers for the customer exchange request. If the airline does not require a second step, then the customer can proceed directly to the order process with the offer generated in the first step with Sabre's NDC Distribution Shopping Exchange API.
  • Some carriers may require a second Order/Reshop step to calculate everything that is needed for the order portion of the flow that was not available in the first step (for example, timeout restrictions when creating multiple offers). In the second step, customer again provides the same order - but instead of giving the change details, provides only the offer from the first step.
  • There are separate endpoints for the first and second Order/Reshop steps.
  • Shopping with qualifiers is not supported.

How to use

Send a request to the /v1/offers/reshop/shop endpoint to get a response with available itinerary options and pricing solutions.\ Send a request to the /v1/offers/reshop/price endpoint to get a response with all details needed for the Order part of the flow (required only for airlines that use the two-step exchange process)

Note: Refer to the OpenAPI specification for more detailed information about request & response schemas, attributes, examples, errors, and more.