A new web portal for language schools to fill leftover places on their courses outside of normal enrolment windows has been launched by Canadian firm islBooking.
Lugza, the creation of former CLLC operative Peter Dutka and his Toronto-based team, was live-piloted from March last year with CLLC’s four Canadian English language schools and is now recruiting other schools, with institutions from the UK, Spain, France and Malta going on-stream in June.
The platform, that runs alongside standard enrolment rather than replacing it, allows agents to log-in and access discounted course vacancies and sell them on to students with a discretionary commission charge. So far 250-300 agents have registered on the system.
The platform allows agents to log-in and access discounted course vacancies
Based on late-booking flight and accommodation deals, Lugza has so far accounted for 6% of CLLC’s bookings. “At the same time CLLC’s enrolment has gone up 5% so the facility is not cannibalising their customer base,” said Dutka, director of Lugza.
Dynamic pricing systems have been regularly discussed by the industry and so Dutka’s initiative could be a significant breakthrough.
islBooking will also be offering a facility called Huntzi, which is accessed by students directly.
The students are then required to sign up with an agency before finding a discounted course.
“Deals that are available on Lugza create an equal deal on Huntzi with 30% commission built-in,” explained Dutka. “The power is in the agents’ hands and they are motivated to sell seats.”
The dynamic pricing model was initially exclusive to members of the International Association of Language Centres (IALC), but islBookings has now added Armbrae Academy in Canada to its client list.
Mindful of copycats, Dutka has no doubt that the model will take-off.
“When we do our presentations no agents ever say ‘no I don’t want access to students where I can control my own commissions’,” said Dutka. “And we’ve never come across any schools who aren’t interested in filling empty seats.”
