DCC Case Study: Vueling
Supporting a leading European airline to deliver additional margin and improve services for customers
The challenge faced
Vueling, a leading European airline had been working with a Dynamic Currency Conversion provider for some time across a limited number of currencies. However, they found that usage of the service by passengers was far lower than predicted, and the solution was failing to deliver the revenue results that the airline was expecting – with many travellers refusing DCC when offered at the point of payment. It was clear that the customer experience of the DCC service was not optimised to deliver successful conversions.
The search for a solution
The airline looked to the market for an alternative provider who could deliver a wider range of currencies, including exotic currencies, and who could enable a better conversion rate and thus revenue opportunities for the business.
It was critically important that the solution worked seamlessly with the existing payments infrastructure within the airline, as well as with the third-party Payment Services Provider (PSP), with whom Vueling had a long-standing and successful partnership. They also needed to provide a superior customer experience through the conversion process, as this was a key focus for the entire business, at every touchpoint with the customer.
Why Fexco?
Vueling chose Fexco based on the superior number of currencies offered through DCC, Fexco’s decades of expertise in foreign currency conversion, and track record of innovating in DCC. The implementation was straightforward, with Fexco and the PSP working together with the airline’s internal IT team to implement the APIs and get the system up and running quickly.
Once the system was live, Vueling started to see benefits very quickly, with a dramatic uplift of passengers taking advantage of the DCC conversion. Between 2018, when the previous solution was in use, and 2019 when Fexco’s DCC solution was implemented, the business experienced an uplift in conversions of around 30% – surpassing all expected benefits forecast.
Vueling was keen to extend the benefits they saw to mobile transactions as well, and in January 2023 deployed the mobile DCC solution, with very little additional implementation work required.
In a short span of time, they saw an uplift in transactions – with a 110% increase in users selecting DCC on their payments.
Eric Olmos, Fraud and Payments Manager at Vueling said:
“Even though we had been using DCC for some time, we were not getting the conversion rates we had anticipated, and even when customers were selecting to use DCC, the system was not as reliable as we would have liked. As an airline focused on delivering exceptional customer service, it was extremely important to us that customers got the best possible user experience from the DCC offer, and that it worked consistently.
Fexco had a clear reputation in delivering foreign currency conversion, and the implementation process was very simple – we were up and running with the new system quickly. The implementation delivered immediate business impact – we were extremely pleased with the results.
This made it an easy decision to extend the DCC offer to our mobile payments – and again, the implementation was easily completed, as the API is very simple to use. Once mobile went live on iOS and Android in January 2023, we saw another significant improvement in take up of the DCC service – delivering a far better customer experience at no additional cost for our travellers, and an additional revenue line for the airline.
We have a great relationship with our account manager, and we are extremely pleased with the DCC service that Fexco delivers.”