US travel agency payments need a clear connection between bookings, money received and travel still to be delivered. ARC’s report released on October 15, 2026 puts that task in focus: September air ticket sales through U.S.-based agencies reached $10.2 billion, up 18% year over year, while passenger trips increased 2%. The practical question is whether an agency’s payment and refund operations can support its own booking mix.
For the wider provider-selection context, see WiseAlt’s payments for travel and hospitality overview. The checks below focus on agencies and online travel agencies, rather than treating airline distribution, hotel acquiring and tour-operator payments as the same business.
What the September release actually measures
ARC’s figures cover reporting U.S. retail and corporate agency locations and online travel agencies. They exclude tickets bought directly from airlines. Sales include ticket taxes and fees; they are not agency commission, profit or freely available cash. The reporting period ended September 30, 2026.
The gap between sales growth and trip growth is a reason to examine the agency’s own transaction values and product mix. It does not establish why a particular merchant’s turnover changed, and it cannot be used to predict that merchant’s approval rate or reserve terms. ARC also reported that NDC transactions represented 21.2% of ARC-settled transactions in September. That is a distribution measure, not a share of payments made with a particular card or wallet.
US travel agency payments: growth is not available cash
A booking can create several different obligations: payment to an airline or consolidator, an agency service fee, a refundable customer balance and a future travel service. Treating the total card charge as revenue available to spend can conceal the timing between those obligations.
A useful operating view separates gross bookings, agency income, supplier amounts due, expected refunds and money actually available in the settlement account. Finance teams should map these amounts by booking date and travel date. A rise in advance bookings may increase the amount of travel outstanding even when settlement arrives promptly.
This is an operational interpretation, not a conclusion reported by ARC. For a provider conversation, show your own figures and explain how long customers typically pay before departure. A short domestic itinerary sold close to travel and a long-haul group booking sold months ahead should not be presented as interchangeable exposures.
Keep booking, payment and delivery records connected
Build a record that joins the booking or order reference to the payment, customer, supplier and service status. Keep the airline record locator or ticket reference where applicable, but avoid assuming that it alone explains every financial movement.
A workable record should let staff answer practical questions: Was the original payment authorised but not captured? Was a supplier paid? Was only one part of the itinerary changed? Has a refund been submitted, or has it reached the customer? A new booking created during rebooking should remain linked to the original financial history.
Payment operations should also distinguish the party selling the journey from the party appearing on the customer’s statement. Otherwise, support staff may direct a customer to the wrong refund owner while finance follows a different transaction.
Refund responsibilities follow the merchant of record
U.S. Department of Transportation guidance says ticket agents that are merchants of record must make proper airfare refunds when an airline cancels or significantly changes a flight to, from or within the United States. Its guidance treats refunds of airline ancillary fees separately. Do not apply one refund owner to every component of a booking.
For each sales channel, document who charged the customer, who owes the refund and which system issues it. Record whether the customer accepted alternative travel. Distinguish a supplier cancellation from a customer choosing not to travel on an operating non-refundable fare.
The customer-facing process also needs an exception queue: partial refunds, expired credentials, rejected refund messages and an open dispute involving the same payment. Reconcile outcomes before sending a second refund. A faster checkout does not remove the need for this work.
Travel agency payment flows and reserves
Ask an independent provider to assess the business actually being submitted: entity country, payer markets, products, booking lead times, supplier model, historical cancellations and disputes. Confirm which settlement account and currencies the proposed arrangement accepts. A Canadian business serving U.S. cardholders should not assume it receives the same terms as a U.S.-registered applicant.
Request written explanations of settlement timing, any reserve or hold, release conditions and refund funding when new sales are low. Model a cancellation event against those terms. Avoid funding the plan only from the assumption that tomorrow’s bookings will cover yesterday’s refunds.
WiseAlt’s guide to choosing a payment processor for a high-risk business provides a broader comparison framework. Provider acceptance and commercial terms remain specific to the applicant; strong industry sales do not establish eligibility.
NDC and orders change the servicing question
There are relevant structural changes behind the monthly sales headline. In January 2026, ARC introduced orders-based reporting and settlement. The initial release supported orders with a cash form of payment; it was not a statement that every order and card workflow was already supported.
Separately, ARC announced in May that SAS had activated Multiple Forms of Payment for specified GDS EDIFACT transactions, including sales, exchanges and refunds. This is a defined participating-airline capability, not a universal feature across every booking channel.
Ask your booking-technology supplier to demonstrate the complete lifecycle for the products you sell. Test a change with an additional collection, a partial cancellation and a refund split across original payment sources. Confirm how those events reach the accounting export. A successful initial sale is only one test case.
A practical checklist for US travel agency payments
- Map the sale. Identify the merchant of record, supplier, booking channel and statement descriptor for each product.
- Explain the delivery gap. Show the distribution of days between payment and departure, rather than only average monthly turnover.
- Reconcile the lifecycle. Join booking, authorisation, capture, supplier payment, change and refund references.
- Stress-test cash needs. Model lower new sales alongside outstanding supplier payments and customer refunds, using actual contract terms.
- Test exceptions. Include failed refunds, mixed payment sources, partial cancellations and simultaneous disputes.
- Agree escalation ownership. Give staff a route to the booking supplier and payment provider, with evidence attached to each case.
Keep U.S. and Canadian merchant assumptions separate
Separate merchant incorporation, payer location, travel destination, presentment currency and settlement-account country. These fields can differ within the same booking. A U.S. customer buying a Canadian operator’s trip to another destination does not make the operator a U.S. entity.
For U.S. payer acceptance, the existing USA payment solutions guide is a useful starting point. The Vuelos Caribe travel payment processing case study describes one merchant engagement; it should be read as a specific case, not a promise of comparable approval, pricing or volume for another agency.
What to do next
The immediate priority for US travel agency payments is a provider-ready account of the booking lifecycle. Use the new ARC figures as industry context, then base processing limits, refund funding and reconciliation decisions on your own customers and supplier obligations.
WiseAlt helps travel merchants compare independent providers, prepare onboarding information and coordinate implementation. Bring your entity details, payer mix, settlement-account country, booking lead times and cancellation process to the discussion. Processing, underwriting and settlement are supplied and decided by the relevant independent providers.
