What is Tourism Exchange Australia?

Tourism Exchange Australia (TXA) is an inclusive booking exchange that incorporates inventory and pricing from multiple booking systems and then distributes it widely to various websites. TXA offers distributors (retailers) and operators (tourism businesses) the opportunity to increase their sales and provide consumers with the ability to source high quality tourism content and book it securely online.

Who owns the Exchange?

Tourism Exchange Australia is a partnership between the Australian Tourism Data Warehouse (ATDW) and VCubed Pty Ltd (V³):

1. ATDW is a private company owned by all State, Territory and National Tourism Organisations. ATDW manages a national database of 27,000 tourism products including accommodation, attractions, tours and events that can be accessed by companies wishing to sell and promote Australian tourism. If your business is listed on visitvictoria.com then you are automatically listed on the ATDW.
2. V³ is an Australian technology company that has developed the Open Booking Exchange (OBX), a neutral platform in which tourism operators and distributors can sell and book live inventory.

Why was Tourism Exchange Australia developed?

In Australia, online booking systems have required tourism operators to maintain multiple listings and availability pools (called allotments), distributors to query multiple networks when displaying inventory and consumers to search multiple sites.

Tourism Exchange Australia was developed to rectify these inefficiencies and provide a neutral, national platform that brings together distributors and product providers. Through the Exchange tourism products can sell their products online to a greater audience and still have the ability to directly negotiate distribution relationships.

Does Tourism Victoria support the Exchange?

Yes. Tourism Victoria has endorsed TXA and has introduced TXA-powered booking on visitvictoria.com for accommodation listings.

Accommodation owners must have signed up to TXA for their products to be bookable on visitvictoria.com.  The functionality for non accommodation product suppliers will be available shortly.

For information on how to join TXA, please contact the visitvictoria.com support desk on 1300 306 366 or via email at

Is Tourism Exchange Australia just for accommodation bookings?

No. The exchange can also be used to search and book tours, attractions, events and festivals.

Initially visitvictoria.com has launched its booking service for accommodation only. Tourism Victoria plans to add TXA-powered tours, attractions, event and festivals in late 2009.

Have other questions?

If you have questions that aren't answered here, please visit our other TXA FAQ pages:

• FAQs about Selling through Tourism Exchange Australia
• TXA Glossary
  

If you have any other questions about Tourism Victoria’s online booking program, please don’t hesitate to contact our industry outreach consultant, Paul Cooper. He can be contacted at