Have you ever had baggage problems when flying? Lost, misplaced, damaged in some way? Did it make you mad? If so, you are not alone. A new study shows that baggage problems irk over one-third of travelers. 34% of all air passengers have experienced baggage-related delays when checking in, depositing or picking up bags on their most recent flight.
The study was commissioned by Amadeus, the Global Distribution System used by many travel agencies, composed by Norm Rose of Travel Tech Consulting and says new technology can help. It details three key “passenger pain points” in the airport experience; Baggage, Delayed or Canceled flights, and Time Delays at check-in and security.
Called “Navigating the Airport of Tomorrow” the study suggests that adopting technology can help solve some of the problems too.
The report found that 18 in every 100 passengers had experienced a delayed or canceled flight during their last travel experience. Ten percent of passengers complained that they had not received “relevant and real-time information.”
The survey found that at 43%, “disruption management” ranked as the single most important area where travelers would like to see improvement.
Just under 40% of travelers said they would “adopt services that delivered real-time information to their mobile devices on flight and baggage status, as well as directions at the airport.”
A third of respondents require greater self-service options, including the ability to purchase additional services at airport kiosks and self-tagging options for luggage.
The survey found that these problems translate into negative perceptions of the carriers. If customers are made to wait in line for longer than 30 minutes to check-in, their perception of the airline swings negatively by 10%.
New, emerging technologies can help too such as one-touch check-in and progress tracking, permanent luggage tag technology that enables bag tracking through the airport, onto the airplane and off again at the final destination and roaming agents with iPad-like computers to provide information to passengers.
Flickr photo by tttallis