vMCO for refundable balance

Issuance of vMCOs (‘paperless’ MD50) for Refundable Balances (Residual Value)

These instructions are for travel agents who are able to issue vMCOs through their GDS System. In this instruction a vMCO is an MD50 transaction where a paper exchange coupon is not produced by the GDS.

A vMCO can be issued to account for refundable balances due from ticket exchanges where the original issue FARE is higher than the FARE on the new ticket.

If a re-issue is requested for a wholly unused ticket and the fare quote for a new ticket shows lower fare than the original ticket, than the original ticket should be refunded in full and a new ticket should be issued and paid.

For partly used tickets, when a sector/sectors of passenger’s journey need to be re-issued to a lower fare, following principles should be applied:

1. Enter Refundable Balance value manually if it is not pre-populated on the GDS vMCO mask
2. Select Reason for Issuance Code ‘K’ (Refundable Balance)
3. Enter the original ticket number in the “Issued in Exchange For” field
4. Issue a new ticket in exchange for the re-routed sector (issued as an ‘even’ exchange, without additional collection)
5. Enter the new (reissued) ticket number in the “Issued in Connection With” ticket number field
6. Issue a VMCO in exchange for the re-routed sector, as an ‘even exchange’, without an additional collection
   
   Note: In some GDSs (such as Amadeus and Galileo) issuing the e-ticket and the vMCO (see above step 4/6) can be combined in one single transaction and the new (reissued) ticket number is added automatically onto the vMCO (see above step 5).
   
7. Since there is no Exchange Coupon in a vMCO, it is not possible to issue a vMCO for Refundable Balance as a part payment for future transportation. There is no coupon to present to the customer, or retain for future use. Therefore, vMCOs issued for Refundable Balance must be refunded immediately and agents must action the refund straight away through their GDS.

BA will monitor the issuance of vMCOs to ensure best practice is followed