Avianca & Easyfly Annouce Expanded Codeshare Agreement At ANATO Travel Industry Event

Bogotá-based airline Avianca announced last Wednesday that it will be doing a codeshare agreement with EasyFly which allows customers of both airlines to book connecting flights to domestic destinations exclusive to either company, with Avianca promising that the plans of expansion will grow towards international flights as well.

Starting March 8, EasyFly passengers coming to and from Puerto Asís (Putumayo), Florencia (Caquetá), Quibdó (Chocó), and Arauca will be able to book connecting flights to the national destinations exclusive to Avianca with only “a single ticket, a single check-in, guaranteed connections and baggage registration to the final destination.”

Easyfly is a Colombian airline specializing in smaller cities.

This will allow many flying from locations such as Puerto Asís to be able to get a connecting flight to more popular destinations not serviced by EasyFly such as Cartagena without having to re-book and worry about multiple check-ins and other red tapes that could mar the process.

“Continuing with the second phase of the codeshare between Easyfly and Avianca demonstrates the interest in connecting our country, facilitating access to remote regions. Thus, the results of 2022 demonstrate the opportunity to expand air connectivity. Our purpose as a 100% Colombian airline is to support the economic and social development of the country, which is aligned with our expansion plan for 2023. We hope to continue mobilizing more Colombians who want to know the wonders of Colombia in this new phase,” Isaac Herrera, EasyFly’s Director of Product and Sales said.

Director of Alliances for Avianca Julio Ordoñez says that this alliance will enhance the experiences of tourists and align with the government’s stated strategy of promoting tourism while moving away from extractive industries typical of developing economies.

Director of Alliances for Avianca Julio Ordoñez (Photo: Loren Moss)

“The codeshare between Avianca and EasyFly is intended to continue serving the country’s regions in a specialized manner and connect them, generating a flow of travelers to them, to enhance their tourist attractions, natural and cultural wealth. During 2022, close to 40,000 passengers flew through this agreement, which demonstrates the immense potential of this strategy to make Colombia a tourism hub,” he said.

In an exclusive interview with Finance Colombia during the annual ANATO tourism industry event in Bogotá, Ordoñez also revealed that the plan for the company in the future is even broader than this, plotting to connect Avianca’s international flights to the local destinations to increase the ease of travel that tourists and other passengers would experience.

“In the upcoming months, two or three months, we will enable eignt additional Easyfly destinations, connecting them as well with the rest of the domestic Avianca network in Colombia; and finally in the second semester, we will be enabling the connectivity of all these routes that are part of the agreement with Easyfly with the entire Avianca network,” Ordoñez said.

“It’s important to emphasize we are going in stages. Today we start national connections with Avianca’s own network. In the second semester, we will expand to international connections with Avianca’s network,” he continued.

“If there is any disruption in the operation, they know they will be rearranged, which wouldn’t be the case if they bought their tickets separately,” he said, as he listed the benefits of the partnership between the two companies, especially for customers of EasyFly.

“[The passengers of EasyFly] are also accessing an immense network of distribution channels, of sales channels, that Avianca has, not just in Colombia but in many countries where it operates. And so today, in sales channels from Avianca in other countries, they are selling this product, so Easyfly is also getting clients and sales opportunities that can boost and expand their market access,” he said.