Air cargo overbooking based on the shipment information record

Overbooking is one of the most important processes of Air Cargo Revenue Management (ACRM). Airlines can improve their capacity utilisation and increase revenue and profitability. Overbooking, however, can on the other hand lead to offloads and suffering service quality. Current overbooking methods usually work on the flight event level and forecast shows up ratios based on historical flight events. These methods were derived from passenger airline overbooking models and imply various problems as the business requirements of air cargo differ significantly from the passenger business. This paper suggests a new approach for ACRM using certain parameters of the Shipment Information Record (SIR) to forecast the show up behaviour of a shipment. As this methodology is again derived from the so–called Passenger Name Record (PNR)–based overbooking of the passenger business, this paper focuses on the analysis whether it is reasonable to adapt the PNR–based method for air cargo. Some basic definitions that are necessary for future research are provided and the results of an expert survey that was processed to identify the parameters that significantly determine the shipment show up behaviour are presented. The aim is to provide the necessary foundations for further research on SIR–based overbooking.