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Latvia’s airBaltic has announced accepting multiple cryptocurrencies, including Dogecoin, as payments for ticket booking. Back in 2014, airBaltic became the first airline company in the world to accept Bitcoin (BTC) for its flight tickets. The company now offers a total of eight cryptocurrencies among its growing list of crypto payment options.
airBaltic Will Convert the Crypto Payments into Fiat
The flag carrier airBaltic has added Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Ether (ETH), and Dogecoin (DOGE), along with four stablecoins pegged to the U.S. dollar such as Gemini Dollar (GUSD), USD Coin (USDC), Paxos Standard (PAX) and Binance USD (BUSD) to its payments options.
Despite enabling crypto payments options, the airline company has clarified that the ticket prices are not denominated in the supported cryptocurrencies.
Instead, the prices are displayed in euros, where cryptocurrency payment gateway service BitPay will convert the received cryptocurrency to fiat at the current exchange rate upon ticket purchase.
This indicates that airBaltic will not retain any cryptocurrency holding but will only convert them into fiat currencies.
Remarking on the latest enhancement of the crypto payment option, CEO of airBaltic, Martin Gauss said:
“As an innovative airline, we always strive to search for ways to improve the customer experience starting from the booking process. Over the years around 1,000 clients have used the payment option, which may not seem like a lot, but still offers passengers a unique payment option hard to find elsewhere.”
Growing Adoption of Cryptocurrencies
Crypto payments on airBaltic will not include an additional transaction cost. Meanwhile, bookings will be available for at least five days ahead of the scheduled departure.
Since airBaltic’s Bitcoin (BTC) acceptance, many other airlines and travel provider companies have also tried to accept cryptocurrencies as payments. Even though the acceptance might not have reached mainstream appeal as anticipated.
Besides, most of the companies only limited it to Bitcoin payment options. But with airBaltic’s recent addition of popular cryptocurrencies, it could be the beginning of wider adoption of cryptocurrencies within the tourism and hospitality industry.