Jetstar supplied photo of SMS check-in at work in amazingly empty terminal
The Jetstar announcement of 100 per cent self service check-in processes in Australian airports, and the eventual charging of a fee to the digitally incompetent to be checked-in by a human instead of a robot, raises an interesting question.
What is the simplest possible ticketing and checking-in system?
All that an airline really wants from the check-in process is confirmation that a booked seat that has been paid for is used by the person holding the receipt.
It doesn’t really care who you are, provided it has the money. The information that is generated and attached to your PNR or passenger name record code, which is a unique combination of letters and numbers, may include data that is useful for security purposes, or most likely, useless.
But from the airline’s point of view, the reading of that PNR or reservation code is the gate pass that gets you on board, or provides the basis for selling you another fare or at least, another fee, if you miss the flight or have to cancel.
In accounting terms, it is the ching part of ka-ching.
Living some distance from Sydney or Melbourne, I use a really simple ticketing and checking in process for the various XPT or Xplorer trains that can be used in combination with flights, or sometimes, to completely avoid them.
The train shudders to a halt at some god forsaken hour at an otherwise deserted highlands station, and at the door of the carriage in which I’m booked, a lady with a torch is waiting to lead me, like a theatre usherette in the 1950s, to a seat in the darkened car. She has my surname on a list and a seat number, Sandilands, Car B Seat 15B, or whatever.
It’s so simple. Country Rail has the money, and a tick to show the fare was used. I don’t even produce the bit of paper.
Maybe, just a thought, this is how it could work at an airport. You have your PNR code stored on your ‘phone, or just written on a bit of paper. At the gate you say PV2X38 or whatever, to the voice sensitive barrier, which lets you pass, and you wander down the aerobridge to the waiting 400-500 seat half hourly shuttle to Sydney or Melbourne, with no more drama than catching a Manly Ferry, or a country train.
That’s even simpler than the tag systems already used by airlines including Air New Zealand and Qantas.
All you would need to do is be at the right gate at the right time, and say the right code.
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Question in Dalek-speak, emenating from the machine as you insert your pass: ‘And have you packed your own luggage, sir/madam?’ Won’t be long before Daleks will be serving you your drinks and bikkies, and then flying the thing too.
(PS: amazingly empty terminal shown in photo? Of course. Don’t you get it? You see, Jet*’s penalty-style education campaign to get the herd to check in ON TIME so WE can depart on time, has worked! The dude’s the last one on.)
“All you would need to do is be at the right gate at the right time, and say the right code.”
Love your work Ben, but you wouldn’t believe how difficult the combination of those three things are for most travellers.
People can fly without ID checks, however if the X-Ray scanner wasn’t plugged in for a few minutes then the entire airport have to be emptied out for rescanning. Is airport security suppose to make sense?
Or how about just a few years ago when I could walk to the counter, someone would say “Sydney again Sir” and by the time I’d said “yes” that had my bags taken and boarding pass printed. Total time, stuff all. Now, it takes at least 10 minutes to get through the automated check in.
But you are right about trains. Arrive at the station five minutes prior, bags in hand. Board, train leaves two minutes later. God help the airlines when Australia gets fast trains. I’d much rather leave before midnight, sleep on the train and alight at 8:30am in the CBD than get up at 4am to make a flight to arrive in the CBD after 9:30am.
I don’t understand the need for check-in at all.
It obviously isn’t for security (because no-one checks photo id).
And it isn’t to tell the airline that I’ve arrived at the airport (because I can check-in online).
It isn’t to give me a boarding pass (because you don’t get one if you scan the machine)
Why can’t I just walk thru security and have my FF card scanned at the aerobridge? Why is it a 2-stage process? Why not 1?
Love it. I speak plain English. What does CHECK IN mean? I arrive at the airport, the glorious Perth airport. I have ALREADY checked in ON-LINE. I have a boarding pass in my hand.
I am surrounded by machines that say “Check-in”. Of I refrain from approaching one of these robots and see if I can deal with my luggage. Of course I cannot! I haven’t “checked-in” (sir). But I HAVE! here is my boarding pass let me just show you…..
No sir, you need to CHECK -IN….. but sorry I already have….. But sir. And so on ad nauseum until on of us breaks.
What if that screen said “Check in: or “Luggage labels here”. A ha! Speaking plain English now are we?
And all those long suffering staff members standing around to deal with pedants like me?
Naturally the greatest airline on the planet did not reply when I suggested the error of their English “instructions”.
And security? Who actually cares anyway?
How about no luggage? NOW we’re talking.
Hi Ben, it was a serious question – I really don’t understand what the point of check-in is. Grateful for your views – why would it be an issue for the airline to allow me to front up at the boarding gate & scan my FF card? They have all the info coded in, and here I am, ready to board. What’s the problem?
Kate,
Apologies for the delay in responding. Using just the loyalty card would be an excellent idea, indeed folding the function of the current Air NZ and Qantas chip-enabled cards for boarding and luggage checking into a single card you could also use in recording points earned in other non airline transactions.
BUT, I think there are a number of issues that would still exist, in that a process that applied to all travellers might be seen as more desirable by the airports and security service providers. Maybe it is just the onset of old age geek-ism on my part, but I like the RFID type function in the Octopus card used on public transport in Hong Kong when the barrier flicks open as I approach with the card untouched inside my wallet.
So an RFID enabled function in a frequent flyer card would be pretty cool in coming years as we find 400-500 people boarding flights that now take up to about 300 people at a time.
Thanks Ben – now I’m embarressed that I looked like I was nagging! Always appreciate your perspective.
cheers
Kate
Well, there’re quite a few thing happening behind the scene – take off and landing weight calculations, amount of fuel required, balance of aircraft maps and so on, do you really want to sit on a plane while all this happening or would you prefer spend another 10 minutes in lounge ? It takes about half a minute to check in via kiosk, does it really matter after half an hour ride to airport ?