Modern Airline Retailing fundamentals. A series of short explainers on MAR — the terminology, the structure, and what changes when airlines move from PNRs to orders.
The six-character booking reference is still here. Probably for longer than anyone would like.
In theory, the six-character booking reference is unnecessary in the OOSD world. The Order ID is the primary reference for everything. It's mandatory, it's unique, and it's what the order management system uses to identify a booking. You don't need the booking reference.
In practice, for anything beyond a simple domestic flight where no one is checking bags, you almost certainly still need one.
Why the old reference hasn't gone away
The issue is interoperability. A lot of the infrastructure that surrounds air travel — baggage systems, APIS (Advance Passenger Information System), ground handling — was built around the six-character code. There's no field for an Order ID in a BSM (Baggage Source Message) or in a standard baggage message. The downstream systems that receive these messages don't know what an Order ID is.
IATA is actively working on updating standards like APIS so that the old identifiers can eventually be dropped. But that work takes time, and the systems on the receiving end take even longer to catch up. For now, an order ID and a six-character booking reference coexist in most real-world implementations. The booking reference, in this world, is essentially a pointer back to the Order ID, a legacy interoperability mechanism rather than the primary thing.
Where does the booking reference come from?
It needs to be unique across the distribution network, which means every provider needs their own approach to generating it. In most cases, the Order Management System (OrMS) generates it; the booking reference originates with the OrMS and is held alongside the Order ID.
What this means for Delivery
From a delivery management perspective, you'll be working with both identifiers. The Order ID is how you interact with the OrMS: every message, every status update, every service change goes via the Order ID. The booking reference is how you communicate with legacy downstream systems that haven't yet been updated to understand orders.
The mental model to hold: the Order ID is the new world; the booking reference is the translation layer into the old one. Both matter for now.
Q: Is the booking reference going away any time soon?
Not until the downstream infrastructure catches up. Bag tags, APIS submissions, ground handling systems — these still expect a six-character code. Until those systems are updated, the booking reference remains part of the picture.