Air passengers want to use personal device to control more aspects of journey: IATA

An overwhelming majority of air passengers prefer to have more personal control over their journey via smartphones and being able to use biometric identification to speed up travel processes, a recent survey by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) shows.

The findings released on Wednesday were based on 10,877 responses from passengers across 166 countries. The focus was on processes and technology in the travel experience, not airline or airport service levels.

The survey found that 70 per cent of passengers are willing to share additional personal information including their biometric identifiers to speed up processes at the airport.

Most passengers (72 per cent) also wanted to be kept informed throughout their journey via travel notifications sent to their personal devices.

"Passengers are willing to share more personal information if it removes the hassle from their travel experience. But it is clear that concerns over data privacy remain," said IATA's Director General and CEO Alexandre de Juniac.

"While the majority of passengers want to use biometric identification instead of a paper passport, 53 per cent of those that did not, said they were concerned about the security of their data. Passengers need to be confident that their data is safe," he said.

The survey found that 83 per cent of passengers want to receive information on the status of their flight and 45 per cent would like information on their baggage.

Passengers also asking for information to help them plan their passage through the airport with 45 per cent wanting to know wait times at security and border control and 37 per cent wanting to know wait times at customs.

Using a smartphone was also identified by more than half of passengers (51 per cent) as their preferred method of check-in.

An airline app was the preferred method of booking for passengers from one of the world's largest aviation markets with 24 per cent of travellers from North Asia preferring this method. It was also the second most popular choice among passengers in the Middle East, favoured by 14 per cent of travellers.

Booking through an airline website, although less popular than in 2018, remains the method of choice for most travellers globally (39 per cent).

In addition, 46 per cent of passengers would prefer to use biometric identification instead of a paper passport for their journey and 30 per cent would opt to use a biometric token to board the plane.

However, passengers once again identified the airport security screening process and border control as two of their biggest pain points when travelling.

Having to remove personal items was identified as a pain point by the most travellers (60 per cent) closely followed by the removal of laptops and large electronic devices (48 per cent) and variations in screening processes at different airports (41 per cent).

IATA said the findings lend strong support to its One ID project which aims to create a paperless airport experience for passengers where they can move from the curb to gate using a single biometric travel token such as a face, fingerprint or iris scan.