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 Idea by: Dr. Y.E. Kocabasoglu
 Objective: To raise free airplane tickets by endorsing an airline company (carrier)
as the official carrier of IFMSA projects/programs.
 Introduction: IFMSA facilitates student exchange by
its professional exchange, elective and similar projects, which mobilizes more than 6,000 students a year; in addition to the
500 IFMSA students for IFMSA's own meetings.
IFMSA needs tickets for its Travel Assistance Fund, for its Executive Board members, and for its project
coordinators and elected senior officers, its Leadership Training Program resource persons and so on... By negotiating a package
deal with a commercial airline company, IFMSA might be able to raise free tickets, by endorsing the company as the
official IFMSA carrier of that year. It is essential that the tickets should not costs students more than the current average
ticket prices. Preferably, this project should be consecutive to a successful Endorsing an Official Carrier
for IFMSA Meetings project.
In addition to the IFMSA people, assuming a 50% student participation (3000 units); this project could raise up to
175 free tickets per year (assuming 5% commission rate), equalling to US$ 70,000 (assuming US$ 400.- per ticket). With much lower
participation (15%, 1000 units), and smaller commission rate (3%) it still raises a significant number of free tickets
(30 tickets, approximate value of US$ 12,000.-).
What Kind of Carrier?: IFMSA should seek for an airline
company which is
- a dependable and well-established company, so it would be easy to promote the company being a considerable choice;
- a carrier that offers acceptable prices; so flying the official carrier will not mean extra financial burdens;
- a carrier which flies many destinations, so participation potential is kept as high as possible;
- a carrier with good connections both in connection time and in locations, so transfers will not be a big extra burden.
In case a company will not cover all the travel bases concerned, than a concortium of two or more carriers with distinct
regional divisions could be approached. Following carriers might prove suitable for this project: Air France, Alitalia,
Austrian Airlines, Iberia, MALEV, TAP.
Project Structure: This is rather a complex project,
requiring a lot of coordination, a sound feedback mechanism, basic understanding and agreement on the division of tasks and
benefits, NMO time and labour. You should clearly identify at least the following:
- Estimate the potential: Study the IFMSA contracts: If IFMSA contract information is not available, at the next IFMSA
meeting, prepare a blackboard with country names listed horizontally and vertically; where thre NEOs should fill in their
quotas after each contract they sign. Identify project-critic contracts: The contracts between Central European countries
might be not relevant for the project, as many students might be taking the train instead; but any contract including a farther
country (e.g. Egypt) will be very relevant.
- Define a marketing strategy: What is the "selling message", in what ways the information will be provided to the
students?
- Define a marketing mechanism: Who will promote this project at national and local level in the NMOs? How would NMOs
benefit from this project? (Maybe by allocating some tickets fro NMOs depending on total IFMSA miles sold in that country?)
- Define a feedback mechanism: How would you count the actual IFMSA miles (miles flown for IFMSA programs/projects),
system should include double checking of carrier's report with students' reports. Few questions might be:
- How will you encourage students to report their purchases? (Maybe by offering "anywhere-to-anywhere free ticket" award?)
- How would you collect information from NMOs and accredit this information? (maybe making a deal only with the headquarters
of the carrier?)
- Who will coordinate all this? (maybe the treasurer, or an elected "fundraiser" member of the EB?)
- Beneficiaries: How would the free tickets be distributed? Some of the beneficiaries might be:
- Beneficiaries of the Travel Assistance Fund; tickets for EOM and GA; for one delegate per country, per year to each.
- EB members; tickets for GA, EOM, and EB meetings; tickets for regional IFMSA meetings; tickets for other
task-specific missions (IMISO meetings, World Health Assemblies, etc.)
- Project Coordinators: Tickets for GA and EOM, one or two tickets for visits to the actual project site per year.
- Elected Senior Officers: Tickets for GA and EOM, tickets for other task-specific missions (liaison officers visiting
the organizations they maintain the contact with), etc.
- Resource Persons / Experts: Tickets to the resource people to come to the LTPs (so they can propose such
weird, impossible ideas!
 )
- NMOs: Number of free tickets shared amongst them, in accordance with the IFMSA miles sold in their countries.
- IFMSA Exchange Fund: supporting number of students (20 a year?) from the industrializing countries to participate in
the IFMSA program/project, within predefined terms and conditions.
- IFMSA Solidarity Fund: One anywhere-to-anywhere free ticket to respectful (and potentially ally) organizations, as
a symbol of solidarity and coopreation: (e.g. Medecins sans Frontieres, the Red Cross, etc.) It is also a good PR work!
Seeking IFMSA Consensus and Preliminary Commitment:
IFMSA should discuss this project in detail as it is a complex process, based majorly on NMO participation and
commitment. To prevent drop-outs, the advantages and disadvantages of the project should be well weighed.
First, a preliminary survey should be done during, say GA, to see if anyone is interested in the project. If so, a consesus
should be sought, to see if this interest could be formulated in some sort of commitment. This idea could be promoted during
the GA by underlining several strong points:
- No extra financial burdens regarding to ticket costs (they will be the same or less than average);
- to NMOs traveling to an IFMSA meeting;
- to students traveling to participate in an IFMSA program/project;
- No obligations whatsoever; except the moral obligation knowing you support a good cause;
- If this proves successful,
- IFMSA can afford more people from industrializing countries to come to IFMSA meetings; more
means for outside contacts; better follow-up of IFMSA projects and liaisons;
- IFMSA gets a periodic and established source of income for EB travel costs and TAF; which will
reduce the membership fees;
- NMOs might also benefit by receiving free tickets for their efforts;
- Project costs will be lower;
- IFMSA can offer a certain number of students a year, travel support (good PR activity!)
Negotiation Strategy:
- Try to negotiate on miles rather than number of tickets: For instance, ask for a free mile per 20 miles flown by IFMSA
people (IFMSA miles). This amounts to 5% commission, but will actually cost the carrier less, since they usually have
free seats in their flights anyway;
- Go with a list of IFMSA countries; to see if the carrier has flights to there; and a list of possible beneficiary countries,
to see if the carrier has flights to there, and if those flights are "full capacity flights" or not;
- Do not try to make a definite agreement first year, as you do not know how much people will actually participate
in the project. Suggest an agreement in principle, which will define the number of free seats to be provided next year, based
on the actual IFMSA miles of this year.
- You can also offer advertisement possibilities for the carrier on IFMSA report book, and letterheads.
- Always negotiate for a year at maximum, to improve your chances next year by provoking competition amonst the
carriers, say, if the project is proven successful!
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