Fly Monarch have become the first European Airline to offer online customers the option of paying for tickets with Paypal. The partnership, which is Paypal’s first move into the British online travel sector, reflects the online payment company’s desire to diversify into new areas of internet commerce.

Previously Paypal has been criticised for being over reliant on eBay, who bought the company in 2002 for $1.5 billion, and indeed the auction website still accounts for nearly two thirds of Paypal’s global sales. The FlyMonarch deal, however, along with a reported agreement with Worldpay, the Royal Bank of Scotland’s online payment division, indicates Paypal’s intention to expand into new areas.

With 153 million registered users worldwide and 15 million in the UK, Paypal could increasingly be seen by big online retailers as an effective way of streamlining their payment process and potentially selling more to existing customers.

In an interview with The Times Carl-Olav Scheible, head of Paypal in the UK suggested that, whilst big internet retailers may have been slow to sign up for Paypal, it may only be a matter of time:

“For companies like Tesco or British Airways, they have a lot of other priorities. Payments is on the list of issues, but in terms of cost, it is at the lower end of it,”
“We will see an increase in the number of big retailers over time, and it’s a matter of sales process and prioritisation.”
According to Liz Savage, managing director of Fly Monarch, the key appeal of integrating Paypal into their online booking process is that it will “further streamline our online booking process”.
Fly Monarch operates scheduled cheap flights to a host of popular European destinations including cheap flights to Spain.