Every air traveler has been there at some point in his or her life: arriving at the airport with bags packed, only to be greeted by long lines of people, last minute changes or other events that add frustration to what should be an otherwise standard procedure.
According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), more than 8 million passengers on average travel on planes each and every day. With that number only expected to grow in the coming months and years, airports and airlines are under increased pressure to try and find ways to alleviate the stresses that air travelers face. And as more consumers routinely see new technology implemented in other areas of their lives, the potential for technology to transform the passenger journey within the air travel and transportation industry cannot be ignored.
As some services become more personalized, passengers are enjoying a greater sense of autonomy and the ability to facilitate their experience themselves, such as using their mobile phone to way-find themselves through the airport. It is no surprise that passengers are taking to travel self-service like a duck to water as it provides them with more choice and control from airport curb side to airside. In fact, a recent survey of global travelers found that passengers preferred self-service technology options, allowing for a more personal, self-directed travel experience coupled with the potential for shorter queues.
The current incarnation of passenger self-service is one that is still in its relatively nascent stage within the airport ecosystem. With the emergence of smartphones several years ago, passengers found themselves able to check into flights in advance, and lately also to use their smartphone to present a mobile boarding pass to airport security and at the gate. Today, new and emerging self-service technology is showing great promise in helping facilitate a smoother, more enjoyable traveler experience from the moment the flight is booked until the moment the passenger leaves the airport of his or her final destination.
To better understand how much passenger facilitation tools have matured is to look more closely at the emerging technologies that are available to assist travelers today.
Improving Passenger Facilitation to Meet Expectation
Meeting the growing expectation for an unfettered access to information – such as real-time updates about flight delays and gate changes, as well as a personalized service for taxi, hotel and retail offers – airports and airlines are collaborating to develop and test innovative ways to offer frictionless customer service. Increasingly sophisticated mobile applications and emerging technologies, like Near Field Communications (NFC), are also likely to play a role in further boosting passenger self-service.
Following in the footsteps of the online check-in at home, home-printed bag tagging is becoming more widely used. Since Alaska Air first piloted the scheme and it was first commercially introduced by Unisys at Billund Airport in Denmark, Iberia, Air France-KLM, Deutsche Lufthansa AG, and Qatar Airways are now just some of the airlines currently using home-printed bag tags, which fliers fold into plastic wallets provided by the airline or airport.
Another area of coming change is with permanent bag tags, or electronic devices that are attached to fliers’ luggage that digitally display their flight information including bar codes. Fliers update the tags via Bluetooth from their smartphones, and the airline can also update the tag if its owner gets rerouted.
Airlines are also moving to improve bag tracking ahead of a June 2018 deadline set by industry groups. This tracking should help reduce the rate of mishandled bags worldwide, as airlines in 2014 lost 7.3 bags per 1,000 fliers, compared with 13.2 bags in 2003.
Maintaining Privacy and Security
While civil aviation is challenged by the need to speed up the pre-flight process, especially in light of projected traffic growth, this also means the aviation community needs to balance security practices to counter ever emerging and adaptive threats by protecting the personal data they collect and store.
Streamlining the check-in and automatic bag drop process will increasingly involve the incorporation of technologies that let the airport recognize passengers throughout the journey. For example, solutions involving the art and science of uniquely identifying passengers, be it via facial recognition, fingerprint, or the scanning of the eye is going a long way towards ensuring airlines, airports, and immigration officials can maintain close watch on in-bound and outbound passengers from a security perspective, whilst processing them faster from a facilitation perspective.
Additionally, technology has proven a useful tool at the airport’s edge. Governments, airports, and the airline industry, today more than ever, are concerned with effective border control. A consistent enjoyable travel experience is key to travel’s future. New technologies such as Automated Border Control (ABC) using kiosks, electronic gates, passports and biometrics; and completion of arrival documents via mobile device are all being implemented around the world today.
However, this also marks a fundamental change as airports themselves may now increasingly be responsible for collecting and storing data. While travelers may provide biometrics data or personal flight details that can be used to get them through the airport faster, airports and airlines need to show the steps they are taking to protect the data to ensure their customers’ security and privacy. Ensuring passengers that their data is protected is critical for these services if they are to gain public support and see widespread adoption.
Better Knowing Your Passenger
Ultimately, the data that airports and airlines receive is incredibly valuable – not just as an enabler of a smoother passenger experience, but for how airports and airlines can tailor their services based on the passenger preferences. For example, data analytics and mobile device use is allowing the industry the ability to track the patterns of repeat passengers, including preferred amenities so that the next time a passenger visits the same airport, customized services can be immediately presented to them. Big data is allowing the industry to infer all sorts of knowledge about retail spending habits, shopping demographics and the like, providing passengers with more to do during their increased dwell time.
Similarly, airport lounges now have tools that allow for greater passenger recognition. Through scanning a standard boarding pass, (and enhancing that with an ID check), entitled passengers seeking lounge access can enter and exit swiftly and with ease, with airlines not having to worry about unauthorized entry.
Where We Go From Here
For those in the air travel industry, these are exciting times with lofty goals set for the future. For instance, the current IATA Fast Travel program goal is to offer 80 percent of all passengers a secure fast travel experience, including a complete suite of self-service offerings, by 2020. To achieve these objectives will require close cooperation between all key airport stakeholders involved, and new attractive, as well as efficient, self-service offerings that passengers can rely on.
Normal operations in travel will ultimately take on a new definition as technology continues to mature and evolve, and enhance the passenger experience. The sooner airlines, airports, and passengers realize, implement and adopt this, the sooner the standards of travel – and hence the travel experience – will improve for all.
Haakan Andersson is the director of airports for Unisys Global Transportation.
