Atraxo - Blog #IATA XMLAtraxo - Blog #IATA XMLhttps://www.atraxo.com/blogs/tag/iata-xmlThu, 27 Aug 2026 18:39:05 +0200http://zoho.com/sites/<![CDATA[Commercial vs Operational Fuel Data]]>https://www.atraxo.com/blogs/post/commercial-vs-operational-fuel-dataTwo aviation fuel platforms can look alike and still do completely different jobs. Here's the real line between commercial and operational fuel data.]]>

Commercial vs Operational Fuel Data: Why the Difference Matters

Two aviation fuel platforms can look almost identical on the surface — and still be built to do completely different jobs.

That's not a marketing problem. It's a structural one. Aviation fuel data splits into two real domains: commercial data, which moves the buyer-seller relationship, and operational data, which moves the refuelling event itself. They live in different places, run on different technology, and work toward different goals. A platform built for one doesn't — and shouldn't try to — replace a platform built for the other.

If you're evaluating a fuel data platform, the first question isn't "what does it do." It's "which domain does it live in." Here's how to tell the difference, and why it matters for the platform you choose.

This is the condensed version — for the full structural breakdown, see the long-form page.

Two domains, one industry

Operational fuel data lives at the airfield. It's captured on specialised hardware — fuel trucks, hydrant dispensers, meters — by the into-plane agent physically connecting the hose to the aircraft. The people moving it are flight operations and turnaround coordinators on the airline side, and the into-plane fuelling agent on the other. Volumes are flight-volume, compressed into the hours before departure, and accuracy matters because errors here delay flights. The objective is e-fuelling: digitising the refuelling event itself, safely and on time.

Commercial fuel data lives at HQ. It runs on SaaS software — procurement, billing, treasury systems — used by people who never touch a fuel hose: procurement, contracting, accounting, and treasury on the airline side, account management, billing, and credit on the supplier side. Volumes are large — a major airline processes tens of thousands of fuel tickets a month — and accuracy matters because every line item flows into financial reporting and audit. The objective is a digitised quote-to-bill process: tender, bid, award, contract, invoice, payment, without a paper trail or a phone call.

The two domains run on different standards, too. Operationally, a delivery gets reported out using IATA Fuel XML Transaction or AIDX XML Fuel Summary — the formats built to carry a refuelling event off the airfield. Commercially, the buyer-seller lifecycle runs on the broader IATA Fuel XML fuel standards (Tender & Bid, Invoice) and IATA IS-XML.

Different location. Different hardware. Different objective. Different standards. Same industry.

The domains meet — twice

The two domains aren't isolated from each other. They depend on each other, in both directions.


Operational → commercial. The operational domain has to send its fuel delivery data to the commercial domain — to the fuel seller and the fuel buyer both — before the commercial process can move. This is where the fuel ticket comes from: the into-plane agent's meter reading, submitted as IATA Fuel XML Transaction or AIDX XML Fuel Summary, imported by the supplier and the airline and used as the ticket for pricing, invoicing, and payment. Getting this connection right — reliable delivery, clean format conversion between what the airfield sends and what the commercial system expects — is a real integration problem, not a formality.


Commercial → operational. It runs the other way too. The operational domain needs fuel authorisations and credit line status from the commercial domain before it can act — the agent on the ground needs to know which customer to fuel, and which to turn away, before the hose goes anywhere near the aircraft. Without that data flowing back from HQ, the airfield is deciding blind on who's actually allowed to buy fuel today.


Neither direction is optional. The commercial domain can't invoice a delivery it never heard about. The operational domain can't safely decide who to fuel without knowing who's authorised and in good credit standing. Two domains, two platforms, one dependency running both ways.

Why the two shouldn't collapse into one

An operational platform doesn't have contract or pricing data. Without it, there's no way to know which customer is actually authorised to fuel today, and no way to turn a recorded delivery into an invoice — that data lives on the commercial side, not the operational one.


A commercial platform doesn't have the specialised hardware to handle or record an aircraft refuelling — the meters, the dispensers, the physical connection to the aircraft. That's airfield equipment, not something a SaaS platform can absorb.


Put the two jobs on one platform and it's structurally missing half of what either job needs. That's why a single combined platform is hard to build well — and why the two domains stay separate, connected by the data flowing between them in both directions.

The platform landscape breaks into three shapes

Once you see the domain line, aviation fuel platforms sort into three categories:

  • Operational-only platforms move AIDX data between airline-ops and into-plane agents. Essential infrastructure — but no commercial layer. They can't tell you what your supplier billed you, or whether an invoice matches a contract.
  • Vendor-defined commercial portals move commercial data, but inside one vendor's customer network. They work well for the counterparties already on that portal — and require a separate integration for every counterparty who isn't.
  • Open commercial exchanges move commercial fuel data across any participant on standards-first infrastructure. One connection reaches the whole network, not one vendor's slice of it.

None of the three substitutes for the others. They complement.

What this means for your platform choice

Start with the question, not the feature list: what domain does your problem actually live in?


If the pain is operational — fuel-order coordination, refuelling delays, mis-fuelling — you need an operational platform. If the pain is commercial — invoice disputes, slow cash, integration overhead across suppliers, contract compliance — you need a commercial platform. And if the pain is "we're stuck inside one vendor's portal and can't reach everyone else," you need an open commercial exchange that extends your reach without replacing the access you already have.


Aviation Hub is that middleware — the connective layer between the operational domain and the commercial domain. It carries fuel delivery data from the airfield into the commercial process, and it carries fuel authorisations and credit line status back out to the agents on the ground. And because it's a shared exchange rather than a point-to-point link, it solves a second problem at the same time: distributing that fuel data to every third party who needs it — every fuel seller, every fuel buyer — from one connection, instead of a new integration for each one.

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Aviation Hub Overview

Read the long-form version →

]]>Tue, 04 Aug 2026 17:49:13 +0200<![CDATA[For Airlines: Streamlining Fuel Ticket Management with Atraxo's Ticket Workbench]]>https://www.atraxo.com/blogs/post/airlines-atraxo-ticket-workbench-fuel-ticket-managementDiscover how the Atraxo Ticket Workbench revolutionizes fuel ticket management for airlines. From digitizing paper tickets to enriching data and automating validations, our solution streamlines workflows, ensures accuracy, and enhances sustainability reporting.]]>

How Airlines Can Master Fuel Ticket Management

Fuel tickets might not be the star of your operations, but they’re the unsung heroes that keep your airline's fuel management process moving smoothly. These small, yet essential documents are the foundation for precise invoice validation, real-time inventory management, and environmental SAF compliance.


But let’s face it—fuel ticket management is anything but straightforward. Paper tickets arrive late, incomplete, or not at all. Even electronic data can show up in formats so incompatible you’d think they were designed to confuse. These challenges create bottlenecks and inefficiencies that ripple through your operations.


At Atraxo, we’ve built the Ticket Workbench to help airlines tackle these issues head-on. Let’s start by exploring the key objectives airlines aim to achieve—and the obstacles that stand in their way.


What Airlines Need (and the Challenges in the Way)

1. Digitizing Data: Turning Data into Information

The Objective: Many refuelers at airports still provide paper tickets, making it difficult for airlines to automate workflows and maintain accurate records. The goal is to digitize these tickets efficiently as a prerequisite to digitalize fuel-related business processes. 


The Challenge: Paper tickets come with a host of headaches:

  • Lost or Delayed Tickets: A late ticket can derail critical workflows.
  • Unreadable Tickets: Smudged handwriting or damaged documents make digitization tricky.
  • Manual Entry Errors: Transferring data by hand is slow, error-prone, and costly.

2. Precise Invoice Validation

The Objective: Fuel tickets are crucial for ensuring suppliers are paid accurately. Airlines need to match ticket data with flight events and contracts to validate delivery quantities, pricing, and terms.


The Challenge:

  • Incomplete Data: Missing data like delivery details or flight information disrupt invoice validation.
  • Data Discrepancies: Mismatches between fuel tickets and flight events create disputes and delays.

3. Real-Time Inventory Management

The Objective: Fuel tickets aren’t just about payments—they’re also the backbone of accurate inventory tracking. Airlines rely on them to manage fuel inventories efficiently across locations.

The Challenge:

  • Inaccurate Records: Errors in ticket data can lead to overstocking or running out of fuel at critical times.
  • Disjointed Workflows: A single missing ticket can cause cascading issues in inventory management.

4. Sustainability and Environmental Reporting

The Objective: As sustainability takes center stage, airlines need precise data to track fuel consumption and SAF (Sustainable Aviation Fuel) usage for proper environmental reporting.


The Challenge:

  • Incomplete SAF Data: Missing details like blending ratios make reporting impossible.
  • Unstandardized Formats: Inconsistent data structures complicate compliance reporting.


​"Before implementing the Atraxo Ticket Workbench, managing fuel tickets was a constant headache. Missing data, paper tickets, and manual corrections slowed everything down. Now, our processes are streamlined, and we can focus on what really matters—running a reliable airline. Atraxo has truly revolutionized how we handle fuel tickets."
​

How Atraxo's Ticket Workbench Solves These Challenges

The Atraxo Ticket Workbench is designed to address these pain points through powerful features that automate processes, validate data, and integrate seamlessly with your systems. Here’s how we help airlines achieve their goals:

1. From Paper to Digital: Simplifying Data Capture

Paper tickets? No problem. Atraxo bridges the gap between analog and digital with tools that make manual data entry almost enjoyable (we said almost).

  • Empowering Station Managers and Suppliers: Enable local teams to capture ticket data directly in the system.
  • Default Values and Smart Tools: Simplify manual entry with pre-filled fields, automatic supplier assignment, and customizable workflows.

These tools not only digitize paper tickets but do so with a focus on accuracy and speed, minimizing errors and delays.

2. Data Transformation: Making Formats Work For You

Fuel tickets come in all shapes and sizes—CSV files, Excel sheets, or IATA XML. The Atraxo Aviation Hub ensures that no matter the format, data flows seamlessly between your systems and your partners.

  • Automated Format Conversion: Forget manual reformatting; we’ve got it covered.
  • Custom Field Mapping: Define how data should flow into your system for maximum flexibility.
  • Handling Incomplete Data: Tickets flagged as missing details are buffered and enriched later, ensuring no ticket gets left behind.

3. Data Validation: Catching Errors Before They Spread

Atraxo ensures every ticket is reviewed and corrected before it moves further in the workflow.

  • Technical Validation: Identify missing fields, duplicates, and format issues.
  • Business Validation: Verify ticket data against flight schedules, contracts, and base data such as aircraft tank capacities.

This guarantees that only high-quality, error-free data enters your operational systems.

4. Data Amendment: Enriching and Enhancing Your Tickets

Fuel ticket data often needs extra context to be useful. Atraxo enriches your data with:

  • SAF Blending Ratios: Add SAF blend ratio information received from your tank farm operator to your fuel tickets to enable proper environmental reporting.
  • Density and Temperature Details: Normalize fuel volumes for accurate inventory calculations.

With the Atraxo Aviation Hub, these enriched data sets are seamlessly shared with relevant stakeholders, ensuring alignment and accuracy across your entire fuel process.

Conclusion: Ready to Take Control of Your Fuel Tickets?

Fuel ticket management doesn’t have to be chaotic. With Atraxo's Ticket Workbench, airlines can streamline processes, validate data effortlessly, and achieve operational excellence. From digitizing paper tickets to enriching data for sustainability reporting, our platform makes it easy to tackle challenges and achieve your goals.


Ready to elevate your operations? Contact Atraxo today and let’s transform the way you handle fuel tickets.

Get Started Now
]]>Thu, 16 Jan 2025 10:28:48 +0100<![CDATA[For Suppliers: Simplifying Fuel Ticket Processes with Atraxo's Ticket Workbench]]>https://www.atraxo.com/blogs/post/suppliers-atraxo-ticket-workbench-fuel-ticket-managementStreamline fuel ticket management with Atraxo's Ticket Workbench. Automate data capture, enrich tickets with SAF ratios and density info, and integrate seamlessly with back-office systems. Reduce errors, save time, and improve customer satisfaction.]]>

Streamlining Fuel Ticket Management: Why It Matters

Fuel suppliers, we know you're busy. Between managing fuel deliveries, juggling customer demands, and navigating the paperwork jungle, it can be easy to feel like you're caught in a never-ending flood of fuel tickets. Manual data entry, paper tickets that disappear faster than your morning coffee, and systems that don’t talk to each other can all slow down your operations and bring your efficiency to a halt.
But fear not, the Atraxo Ticket Workbench is here to help! We’ve built a supercharged ticketing system that’s all about streamlining fuel ticket management, reducing errors, and getting fuel data where it needs to go—on time and with zero hassle. Ready to optimize your processes, save time, and keep your customers happy? Let’s dive in.

Key Challenges Facing Aviation Fuel Suppliers

Paper Tickets = Manual Data Entry = Manual Errors
We get it—no one likes typing in fuel ticket data by hand. It’s time-consuming, prone to mistakes, and let’s be honest, it’s pretty mind-numbing. When you’re juggling hundreds of tickets, mistakes are bound to happen—incorrect quantities, missing fields, or worse, duplicated entries. And we all know where that leads: late payments and unhappy customers. Yikes.

Incompatible Data Formats = Integration Nightmares
Your refuelers might send you fuel tickets in IATA XML, CSV, Excel, or even the dreaded paper. Trying to get these into your system without pulling your hair out can feel like solving a Rubik’s Cube blindfolded. And if your systems don’t play nice with these formats? Let’s just say you might be stuck with a whole lot of paperweight.

Incomplete Data = Invoicing Chaos
Missing data like SAF blend ratios or fuel density? That’s a recipe for incorrect invoices, inventory problems, and a whole lot of customer complaints. The last thing you want is an angry airline on the phone because their invoice was, well, “off.”

How The Atraxo Workbench Solves These Challenges

Fuel Ticket Data Capture—Simplified and Error-Free

  • Manual Ticket Capture: Whether you’re manually capturing a single fuel ticket or generating new ones using data from previous days, Atraxo's Ticket Workbench lets you do it all effortlessly.
  • Reissue Fuel Tickets: If mistakes happen, no worries—simply correct the fuel ticket and resend it as a reissued ticket, keeping your records straight and your back-office system up-to-date.
  • Automatic Field Management: You can customize the ticket attributes shown to users, hide unused fields, and even set default values, whether on a user level or system-wide, making the input process as easy as possible.

Data Enrichment—Make Your Data Work Smarter

  • SAF Blending Ratio & Flight Information: Automatically import SAF blending ratios, flight information, and even the flight type (domestic or international) to enrich your ticket data for accuracy and consistence.
  • Density and Temperature Import: Never again will you have to manually enter density and temperature data. The Ticket Workbench can pull this info from external sources (like your inventory system) and update the fuel tickets automatically.
  • Net Volume Calculation: By using the imported density and temperature information,  Atraxo's Ticket Workbench calculates the net (normalized) volume of fuel for each ticket, so you don’t have to worry about discrepancies in your data.
  • Buffering Incomplete Data: If a fuel ticket is missing crucial info (like density or temperature), the system buffers it and only sends it to the back-office system once all required data is available.

Seamless Import and Data Transformation

  • Flexible Import Formats: Whether it’s IATA XML, CSV, or Excel, the Ticket Workbench can import fuel tickets in any format you need. If you’re getting tickets via Atraxo's Aviation Hub Data Exchange (sFTP or REST API), the system integrates them with no fuss.
  • Automated Ticket Number Adjustments: Need to update fuel ticket numbers? Atraxo's Ticket Workbench can automatically concatenate the airline designator to the fuel ticket number, keeping everything organized and compliant.
  • Mark Reissued Tickets: When importing data from Excel files, the system identifies and marks reissued tickets based on the original ticket number, so you’re always working with the most current information.
  • Defuel Ticket Adjustments: If you’re dealing with defuel tickets, no worries—our Ticket Workbench changes positive values to negative, ensuring your data reflects the correct volume.

User-Friendly Workflow and Restrictions

  • Automatic Location & Fueler Assignment: Based on the departure location, the Ticket Workbench automatically assigns the correct fueler and supplier to each ticket.
  • Customizable Mandatory Fields: You can set restrictions on mandatory fields, making them mandatory only when the conditions are met—say goodbye to unnecessary data entry!
  • User Role Management: Using role-based access control, Atraxo's Ticket Workbench ensures that only the right users have access to the right fuel tickets and actions. External partners can be limited to seeing only tickets captured by their team members, ensuring tight data security and control.

Integration with Back-Office Systems

  • Seamless Transfer to Back-Office: Once fuel tickets are validated, enriched, and ready, the Ticket Workbench automatically sends them to your back-office systems using formats like IATA XML or custom CSV/Excel formats.
  • Automatic Transfers via API: Whenever fuel tickets are received via the Aviation Hub Data Exchange, they are automatically processed and sent to the back-office, ensuring that no time is wasted and no ticket is left behind.
  • Period Control: To maintain integrity, the system blocks users from sending or resending fuel tickets outside the allowed period, preventing any unauthorized changes that could affect your period closing.


​"Before using the Atraxo Ticket Workbench, managing fuel tickets was a tedious and error-prone process. Now, with automated workflows and accurate data validation, we save hours every week and have full confidence in our operations. It’s a game-changer for our team!"
​

Benefits for Fuel Suppliers Using the Atraxo Ticket Workbench

  • Faster, More Accurate Data Handling: From manual capture to automated enrichment, the Ticket Workbench ensures that every fuel ticket is accurate, complete, and ready for transfer without the need for constant checks and corrections.
  • Seamless Integration with External Systems: Whether you’re pulling data from external sources or transferring it to back-office systems, Ticket Workbench integrates all your data effortlessly, making your workflow smoother and more efficient.
  • Customizable Workflows: With customizable mandatory fields, default values, and role-based user management, you can tailor the system to fit your specific operational needs.
  • Improved Data Integrity: Real-time validation and automated corrections mean you’ll reduce errors, improve data quality, and save valuable time.
  • Stronger Relationships with Airlines: By streamlining ticket processing and ensuring timely, accurate data, you’ll enhance your reputation and customer satisfaction with airlines.

Conclusion

Gone are the days of manual errors, paper ticket chaos, and format headaches. With Atraxo's Ticket Workbench, fuel suppliers can streamline fuel ticket processing, enrich ticket data, and ensure better data integrity across the board. From capturing data to sending it to back-office systems, the Ticket Workbench makes your entire workflow more efficient and accurate. Ready to save time, reduce errors, and deliver exceptional service to your airline customers? Let’s go!

Get Started Now
]]>Tue, 14 Jan 2025 15:07:31 +0100<![CDATA[Aviation Fuel Data Exchange made easy]]>https://www.atraxo.com/blogs/post/the-atraxo-data-hub-aviation-fuel-data-exchange-made-easyBusiness process digitalization and automation is a growing trend in the aviation fuel industry. The IATA XML fuel data standards in combination with the Atraxo Data Hub SaaS product represent a great solution to enable existing IT systems to participate in IATA XML-based data exchanges]]>

Exchanging data with your Aviation Fuel Business Partners is not as difficult as it seems

Business process digitalization and automation is a growing trend in the aviation fuel industry. An important element for process automation is the availability of structured data. While the IATA XML fuel data standards already provide a proven framework for structuring data in a standardized way, the implementation of data transmission infrastructures and the enablement of legacy IT systems to deal with IATA XML-structured data is considered a complex and costly endeavor which is a challenge for many organizations. But is doesn't have to be. The IATA XML fuel data standards in combination with the Atraxo Data Exchange SaaS product represent a great solution to enable existing IT systems and to participate in IATA XML-based data exchanges with business partners.

Introduction to IATA XML Data Standards

Thanks to the IATA XML fuel data standards developed over the past years by the IATA Fuel Data Standard Group (FDSG) of which Atraxo is a member, the aviation fuel industry has already access to an established framework that is used industry-wide to exchange commercial and operational data between business partners. As of today, the IATA XML fuel data standards include i) Fuel Tender/Bid XML schema, ii) Fuel Operational XML schema, iii) Fuel transaction XML schema, and iv) Fuel Invoice XML schema. More information about the IATA XML fuel data standards can be found on IATA's website at https://www.iata.org/en/programs/ops-infra/fuel/data-standards.

XML stands for eXtensible Markup Language and provides a description of data elements that can be included in a certain XML message. In this sense, the IATA XML fuel data schemas define the "language" to be used to build XML messages which are exchanged between business partners. Examples for XML messages are fuel invoices, fuel tender invitation, fuel bids, or fuel tickets. Due to its structured data representation, XML is ideally suited for processing by IT systems and therefore is an essential component for the digitalization and automation of business processes.

Using the IATA XML fuel data standards, business partners can now easily exchange fuel-related business documents in a standardized way that allows immediate processing by IT-supported processes. This is a huge achievement compared to previous processes when paper documents were faxed, PDF documents emailed, or Excel sheets shared. 

Current Challenges

However, before enjoying the benefits of automated data exchange, two topics need to be addressed. 

First, to connect the IT systems of business partners, both sides need to agree on the technical method of data transmission. In praxis, three methods are in use today which are i) sFTP (secure File Transfer Protocol), ii) eMail attachments, and iii) web services. The decision which of these transmission methods to use often depends on the capability of the IT systems installed. It is not uncommon to see that for example a fuel supplier needs to maintain individual data connections to each of its customers, utilizing different transmission methods. Such IT setup can become quite complex and therefore costly to maintain when doing business with a large number of business partners. 

The second and more severe topic is the capability (or lack of capability) of IT systems to generate and process XML messages built according to the IATA XML fuel data standards. While existing IT systems have the capability to generate say fuel invoices, they lack the capability to send the fuel invoice in the IATA XML fuel invoice format to their customers. Such inability to produce IATA XML formatted business documents can seriously impede the growth of an organization since almost every company today is looking  to digitize and automate its business processes which required the availability of structured data such as XML-formatted massages. Enabling existing IT systems to process XML data according to the IATA fuel data standards is in almost all cases a costly activity and might also depend on the willingness of the IT system provider to play along. 

How Atraxo Data Exchange can help

Luckily, there is a solution to overcome the above mentioned challenges. The Atraxo Data Exchange provides a centralized IT platform that enables the secure exchange of structured data between business partners. These structured data are organized in form of messages which consist of a message header and a message body. The message header is comparable to the outside of an envelope that contains information such as sender, receiver and type of content sent. The message body contains the message itself in form of an XML or similar structure. To ensure confidentiality, the business partners exchanging data can encrypt the message body using any public/private key encryption method.   

Functioning as a post office, the Atraxo Data Exchange receives data messages from business partners connected to the data exchange. These messages are processed by a message bus system that guarantees delivery to the receiver or list of receivers as defined in the message header. Since the data exchange takes care of the data delivery, each business partner just needs to configure a single data connection per content type to exchange data with any partner connected to the data exchange. Obviously, this is a huge improvement to the previous situation where individual connections to each business partner had to be configured and maintained.
Another important feature of the Atraxo Data Exchange is the concept of data converters. Data converters are small software programs that process the message body of data messages. Typically, data converters are used to change the format of data contained in the message body. Therefore, data converters are very powerful tools to enable existing IT systems to participate in IATA XML-based data exchanges. Assuming the existing IT system can export/import the required data in any format, the IATA XML enablement is quite straightforward. Firstly, establish a data connection between the IT system and the Data Exchange, using any of the supported transmission methods. Atraxo will then implement a data converter that converts the custom data format provided by the IT system into an equivalent IATA XML message representation. The converted XML message is processed by the Data Exchange transport system and delivered to the intended receiver. The same data conversion process also works the other way around when the IT systems expects to receive data in a custom format. Thus, the data converter concept provides a cost efficient option to enable existing IT system to participate in IATA XML-based data exchanges. 

To learn more about the Atraxo Data Exchange and the benefits it provides, please visit https://www.atraxo.com/aviation-hub.
Get Started Now
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