BANGALORE: Air Deccan announced a tie up with Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) to sell Air Deccan Air Tickets at HPCL petrol pumps.
HPCL Retail executive director S P Choudhary said that Air Ticketing was another product that HPCL was introducing as a part of the bouquet of product and services HPCL offer to customers at petrol bunks. The bulk of the customers at petrol refueling stations were the middle class, the very segment that Air Deccan wanted to tap.

 
 
"We want to ensure that the middle class has access to Internet in the country in our delivery system, our customers must have more options for ticketing sources, we're expanding our network to connect the interior parts of the country and want to make tickets easily available, we are simplifying the purchase process of Air Deccan tickets," said Air Deccan MD G R Gopinath.
 
 
This association will help integrate small cities with large metros in the country and provide a base of around 250 million middle class customers. The cash earned by petrol pumps could also be rolled over due to the sale of tickets. It is a win-win situation for both Air Deccan and HPCL.
 
 
HPCL staff have been trained by Air Deccan for new ticket distribution, which will initially be channelised through 10 select petrol pumps in Bangalore and could involve a network of the 2000 Club HP petrol pumps across the country within a yeas time. HP expects to upgrade another 1000 petrol pumps to Club HP and these too could be brought in the loop to sell Air Tickets.