It’s Not Too Late to Scale Air Travel for Holiday Peak

Passenger numbers have risen to an all-time high since the beginning of the pandemic, and the air travel industry is struggling to cope with rising passenger numbers – leading to frustrated travelers and employees alike. Zurich Airport reports the highest passenger numbers since the outbreak of the pandemic and 456% more passengers than last year. In Europe alone, over 15,000 flights were canceled – often at short notice as limits on the daily number of passengers are being enforced in some regions.

As a result, passengers are facing disruption, long queues, and delayed baggage. But the airline and airport staff suffer too. Pilots, flight attendants, security personnel, and baggage handlers report that they are being overworked and stressed like never before. This unpredictable situation is likely to last through the peak summer season, while autumn brings new unknowns that must be dealt with.

In this blog, we explore how you can get more out of your existing capacity by equipping airline and airport staff with Scandit Smart Data Capture on smart devices. Alleviate pressure on workers and enhance passenger experiences at every transit touch point – from check-in to baggage management.

Scaling capacity with agent superpowers

After two challenging years, airports and airlines face a huge surge in peak travel season that is putting operations under serious pressure. The right technology plays an essential role in making passengers’ and employees’ lives easier.

Scandit Smart Data Capture on smart devices automates, updates, and mobilizes processes to give a modern and sleek impression compared with rugged devices at fixed stations.

It gives customer service agents the power to:

Add speed and flexibility to passenger management – mobilize and fast track processes by moving routine tasks onto smart mobile devices to cope with change. For example, respond quickly if there is a last minute cancellation or gate change. Or adapt when new processes such as scanning vaccine passports are required.

Reduce queuing times – mobile agents can patrol queues, scanning IDs, passports and booking QR codes to speed passengers through the check-in process.

Provide passenger assistance anywhere in the airport – scanning boarding passes delivers real-time data like flight times and departure details, giving airline staff all the information they need to respond to passenger queries, essential at the moment with frequent changes.

Scan any luggage tag reliably – high performance scanning on smart devices can scan any bag tag for consistent tracking from check-in, to the ramp, to the arrival hall. Baggage service offices can efficiently locate the right bag with augmented reality-powered search and find. Gate agents can manage oversized luggage during boarding- easily check bags into the hold with a quick scan.

Respond to disruption with great service – Instantly issue vouchers to delayed or inconvenienced passengers by scanning boarding cards or codes.

Personalize the services offered – scan documents to access details about a passenger’s seat preferences or dietary requirements.

Differentiate service – Do more upsells and cross-sells, due to passenger insights captured from scanning passenger documents.

Check out our infographic on how airlines can deliver a safe, smooth, and satisfying journey in today’s turbulent environment.

Reduce operational costs with one multi-functional device

Using smart data capture on mobile devices reduces operational costs. Replacing fixed hardware, like boarding gate readers, with scanning-enabled apps that work on mobile devices reduces the total cost of ownership by between 35% and 50%.

And unlike fixed scanners, using a single mobile device enables customer service agents to perform multiple tasks anywhere in the airport, facilitating a smoother passenger transit with enhanced services like mobile Point of Sale, efficient lounge access, lost luggage retrieval, and faster flight boarding.

Alaska Airlines is a great example of how Scandit-powered apps on smart devices give agents the mobility and flexibility they need to provide a more efficient and superior standard of customer service:

Enabling our agents to be mobile, frees them from being tied to hardware and allows us to reimagine the boarding experience without the usual podiums. If we need to change gates, we can just walk over with our iPads. If there is a guest that needs special assistance before boarding, we can provide customer service beside them instead of having them come to a podium.

Francis Brown, Product Manager at Alaska Airlines

Have the flexibility to manage unpredictable passenger volumes

With unpredictable passenger numbers and the risk of sudden changes in travel rules, a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective solution is essential.

Scalability and flexibility are two major advantages of Scandit Smart Data Capture. Every staff member with a smart device can become a mobile agent delivering passenger services, so handling fluctuating passenger numbers and new operational demands is easy.

It eliminates the need to have extra expensive equipment to cope with peaks in demand.

Employee onboarding is easy too. The intuitive experience from a mobile app that employees are already familiar with eases acceptance and minimizes the training required.

Enjoy superior performance and easy deployment

Our Smart Data Capture platform is simple and quick to integrate and deploy. It delivers unmatched speed, accuracy and intelligence to any native, mobile or web app.

High-performance scanning is assured, even from a distance, in low light and to capture information from passengers’ poorly self-printed documents. It ably copes with e-tickets presented on devices that are difficult to see due to glare or cracked screens.

All types of codes can be scanned, including Aztec codes on digital boarding passes, PDF147 on printed ones, Machine Readable Travel Documents (MRTD), and ePassports with RFID.

Augmented reality functionality overlays deliver real-time information directly to a device screen including flight and upgrade information, or special promotions – all designed to add a special touch to a passenger’s experience.

Discover more about how to get more out of your existing resources, while improving the customer and employee experience in our guide: Time for Passenger Experiences to Take Off With Scandit Smart Data Capture. Or contact us to start a conversation.