Case Histories › First Choice Holidays & Flights Ltd

Multi-platform messaging connects holiday company across the world

First Choice is one of the biggest names in the leisure travel business, operating across both mainstream and specialist holiday and charter flight sectors. In addition, under its group umbrella, are other established holiday services providers such as Unijet, Hayes & Jarvis, Sovereign, Flexiski, Citalia, Sunsail and Island Cruise. Martin Whitear is the company's Unit Systems Administrator, based at group headquarters at Crawley, near Gatwick Airport, and is responsible for ensuring the smooth flow of information around the group.

Problem

Martin Whitear says: "We were using an internet service, but found it too unreliable. At one time we had a ten-day downtime which caused tremendous problems. It was after that we looked for a better solution and found Autopage who have installed an Email Gateway system for us which has now been running a couple of years."

Solution

The Autopage system is used as a vehicle to get information out to around 60 directors, senior managers and other key people in the business. Emails containing information such as sales figures are sent via the gateway, installed on a PC at headquarters, out to mobiles and hand-held Blackberry units at the start of each day to keep recipients up-to-date with what is happening in the business. Messages are sent both automatically and manually.

Different groups are set up within the system for messages to go to individual brands like First Choice, Sunsail or Hayes and Jarvis. Other groups go across the businesses, such as one for the Duty Office to send out alerts when there is a major environmental incident such as the South-east Asian tsunami or the Pakistani earthquake.

The Autopage Email Gateway is also used to monitor that the data warehouse system is working properly and will send alerts to highlight problems such as whether individual machines are alive on the network. "From an IT perspective, it is a very effective monitoring tool, giving progress reports and allowing us to be proactive in keeping information flowing, rather than waiting for others to highlight the problem to us. "Once the software was installed and it was up and running, we discovered a few issues, such as the way text was formatted on to mobile screens, but Autopage quickly adjusted these for us and the whole system was configured to operate to our needs," Mr Whitear says. "Autopage provide an excellent and quite personal service. I was really impressed with how quickly they responded to our initial inquiry and subsequent calls for help. What is good is you get straight through to someone who can help."