Eight New Hotel Brands partner Abacus Best Available Rates Programme

Eight additional hotel brands are to partner with Abacus' Best Available Rates (BAR) program that guarantees travellers and travel agents the best available rates from partner hotels.

The new brand partners include Americas Best Value Inn by Vantage, Design Hotels, Langham Hotels International, Lexington Collection by Vantage, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Meritus Hotels and Resorts, Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts and Sol Melia Hotels.

Craig Fong, Vice-President of Non-Air Content for Abacus, said the new partners provided a strong endorsement of the market-reach benefits of the Abacus Best Available Rates programme and said they would substantially increase the range of rooms and locations available for booking through more than15,000 Abacus affiliated travel agency locations.

"Since its launch in June last year, Abacus BAR has created significant awareness amongst the travel agent community for our hotel partners, providing greater exposure of their best available rates which translate into more customers visiting their properties," Mr Fong said.

Abacus BAR was developed in close collaboration with founding partner hotels which included InterContinental Hotel Group, Marriott International, Millennium & Copthorne, Raffles International Hotels and Resorts and WORLDHOTELS.

Ms Agnes Battad - Director of Corporate Reservations and Distribution, Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, said that reach of the solution throughout the Asia-Pacific region was a compelling factor in the brand's move to participate in Abacus BAR.

"The Abacus BAR solution features all the key information for travel agents to quickly find the best priced accommodation to suit their travellers' needs and the intensive reach into 15,000 locations in 24 Asian markets is particularly attractive," Ms Battad said.

Over the past month, Abacus has observed an increasing interest from China in its Abacus Bar Programme. In the past month it has recorded large attendances of more than180 travel agents at forums held in Guangzhou, Shanghai and Beijing in conjunction with Marriott, IHG, WORLDHOTELS, Langham, Mandarin Oriental, Meritus and several hotel brands not as yet represented by Abacus BAR.

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