5.10 Release Notes

Released 30 April 2022

Release Highlights

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Travel Check

Export PDF

Though the Travel Check PDF export function was released in Dec 2021 as part of our 5.9 Release, this update provides an array of front and back-end enhancements to provide both a better user experience (UX) and more easily readable output (document).

This release includes the following enhancements to the PDF export:

• Download timeframe reduced to approx. 5 seconds

• Agency logo size increased

• Header font size increased

If the generation of a document is blocked or contains only blank pages, the device’s security settings and plug-ins (e.g. Grammarly) should be checked for possible adjustment or disablement.

While IATA Timatic data is reviewed and updated frequently, it is done only on the basis of government sources and not what may be published by media outlets. Timatic data has broad implications due to its use not only by Kudos but also GDSs as well as airlines and airports globally to perform documentation checks of passengers. Though this may be a more conservative approach, it is designed to ensure IATA is accurate and can be 100% relied upon by airlines and airports as well as our Travel Platform users.

Government Travel Advisory - Safe Travel (NZ)

Kudos has performed multiple enhancements for the New Zealand Government’s MFAT Safe Travel advisory service available on the travel platform.

• Kudos has moved away from using the Safe Travel RSS, instead adopting smarter ways of achieving the same and more.

• This was necessary with the RSS data including an out-of-date “pubDate” (published date), as seen in the example below in early 2021.

Safe Travel website	Safe Travel RSS

More recently, with the relaxing of New Zealand’s borders, changes were made to ensure countries with Safe Travel “COVID-19” warnings only are no longer categories with a risk rating of 5 (highest).

• Instead, countries that only hold a “COVID-19” warning are now categorised by Kudos with a risk rating of 2 "Exercise normal safety and security precautions".

Like all country travel advice, the following examples are where the MFAT (Safe Travel) advisory information can be found throughout the travel platform.

Header Section

• The styling for this has also been updated to allow the information shown to be more readable.

Trips & Care

• Country-level travel advice

Trips
Care

Request

• Country-level “Travel Advice” with MFAT (Safe Travel) information now adopting Kudos’ dynamic country maps for consistency.

  • The dynamic maps were deployed in May 2021 as part of our 5.5 Release. Details of the maps and the various colour coding that corresponds to the risk rating (level) can be found here.

System Integrations

Magnatech (Unused Tickets)

A soft launch of the integration of Magnatech unused tickets as part of the Credits feature was completed in Mar22. This release provides formal notification of the travel platform’s capabilities to present unused tickets (credits) captured via the Magnatech OnTrackplus.

Requirements for an agency to be able to enable the Magnatech REST API integration include:

• An existing or new Magnatech OnTrackplus agreement,

• REST API credentials provided to Kudos, and

• Travel platform Profiles (travellers) with users' email addresses and traveller unique IDs (TIDs) that match with bookings (PNRs) and the unused ticket data of the traveller harvested by Magnatech.

Kudos Administration users can discover more by visiting Admin Help Centre > Platform Implementation > System Integrations > Unused Tickets.

Platform Administration

Travel Check

The following provides a breakdown of the document output (PDF) into selected sections/pages and the source of the information being shown.

Agency Logo

Front Page

No.	Description
1	The agency’s profile in the Admin is used to source the logo.

In the near future we hope to be able to allow the Travel Office’s logo to be used, if set.
Currently the Travel Office logo feature though shown in the Admin is unavailable.

Contacts

Footer & Back Page

No.	Description
1	The agency’s profile in the Admin is used to source the “Agency Name”.
2	The agency’s profile in the Admin is used to source the “Email Contact”.
3	The travel office profile the user (e.g. traveller) is associated with is used to source the “Phone Contact”.
4	The Travel Office – Timezone is used to derive the date/time and timezone (e.g. +08:00 AWST). Though no adjustments should be necessary, this setting is found in the Admin.

Syncs

The following Serko, Concur and Amadeus SYNC items were deployed in Mar22.

• The following information recaps each enhancement, further to notifications provided to our agency partners at the time.

Serko - Domains

The Company Serko Sync - Serko Domain setting has been enhanced to allow for variations each agency may have.

The Serko Domain now requires the agency’s specific (full) domain (e.g. kudos.serko.travel), versus previously it was the sub-domain only (e.g. kudos).

Please be mindful of the new Serko Domain requirement, especially when implementing a new client’s Serko Sync.

This enhancement was completed to future-proof the Serko Sync setup in Kudos to handle variations an agency may have with Serko e.g. <agency>.zeno.travel.

At the time of deploying the above enhancments (Mar22), a database (DB) script was run by Kudos that updated all active Company Serko syncs of each agency with the required (full) domain.

Although no action is required for existing company Serko Syncs, should a Sync Failure Report be received similar to the one below, the most likely cause is the Serko Domain.

• It may have been reverted manually via the Kudos Admin to the original (sub-domain).

• If this is the case, it should be adjusted to the (full) domain with the update saved to then allow successful Serko syncs to once again occur.

Amadeus - Credit Cards

Enhancements were made to allow a company’s Credit Card data stored in Kudos to be synced with the Amadeus Company (C) profile as “FP” (Form of Payment) and “RMF” (Remark with Category F) elements.

Amadeus Cryptic (“green”) Screen

Amadeus Graphical Mode (GUI)

Credit card data previously, even when stored at the Company level in Kudos, only ever synced with the Amadeus Traveller (T) profile.

This enhancement considers various scenarios, including where Credit Cards are recorded for both a Company and its Traveller(s). This is to ensure only one (1) Credit Card is ever synced to the Amadeus “FP” element as only a single instance of this element is supported in a PNR. A Credit Card Matrix is available to Kudos Administration users (Company Config - Addresses & Credit Cards) that provides a high-level understanding of various scenarios with the Credit Cards of a company and traveller.

• Depending on the setting(s) applied (e.g. GDS Default Payment = No), the company’s credit card may not be prioritised over the traveller’s to determine what is sent to the Amadeus “FP” element.

The Amadeus Company (C) profile example above, additional shows credit card data being sent as a Remark (RM) using “F” category i.e. RMF/. This is a newly added functionality as well.

The Amadeus Traveller (T) profile while always including credit cards as RMF elements, has been enhanced to include a suffix to allow a traveller’s credit card(s) to be easily identified.

The following Merged Profile Display (PDMN) in Amadeus provides examples of credit card RMF elements stored in the Amadeus Company (C) and Traveller (T) profiles.

• Traveller (T) credit cards will include the suffixes:

  • The Cardholder's Lastname e.g. (MCCAW), and

  • If the "Corporate Card" toggle is enabled (yes) "-CORP" will also be added e.g. (WHITE-CORP).

• Company (C) credit cards will include the suffixes:

  • (COMPANY-DEFAULT) if the "GDS Default Payment" setting is enabled (yes),

  • (COMPANY) if the credit card is not associated with a Department/Cost Centre and the "GDS Default Payment" setting is disabled (no),

  • (DEP:Dept. Code) for a credit card associated with a Department e.g. (DEP:RUGBY),

  • (CC:Cost Centre Code) for a credit card associated with a Cost Centre e.g. (CC:ALLBLACKS)

At the time of deploying the above enhancments (Mar22), a database (DB) script was run by Kudos that updated all active Company and Traveller profiles of each agency to re-sync with Amadeus. This was completed to allow the aformentioned changes to be inherited (applied).

Serko - Approvers & Arrangers

These enhancements support the sending of the Serko Profile Code and Employee ID identifiers of the Approver(s) and Arranger(s) of a traveller when either of these options is the Unique Profile ID setting for the company’s Serko sync.

To ensure Authoriser and Arranger assignments will generate successfully with Serko, the corporate site in Serko must have the Corporate Option “Profile Maintenance - Unique Profile ID” activated. Additionally, the setting here as well as the Serko sync Unique Profile ID (in Kudos) must match.

The following is an example of the enhanced Serko XML Request showing Serko Profile Codes for the Approver and Arranger (Travel Coordinator) assignments of the traveller.

 <FormOfPayments UpdateType="Full"/>
     <Authorisers UpdateType="Full">
         <Authoriser AuthoriserID="StarkTony0"/>
         <Authoriser AuthoriserID="PottsPepp0"/>
         <Authoriser AuthoriserID="HoganHapp0"/>
     </Authorisers>
<TravelCoordinators UpdateType="Full">
         <TravelCoordinator TravelCoordinatorID="JarvicEdw0"/>
     </TravelCoordinators>
<Roles UpdateType="Full">