Universal automated check-in just around the corner, says Star Alliance

All airline passengers will soon be able to check in on their smartphones and use permanent luggage tags to avoid the need for printed stickers, says Star Alliance CE Mark Schwab. The 28 members of the airline alliance agreed to step up automation efforts to help improve the check-in and baggage experience at a meeting in Zurich on Saturday. By the end of next year, Star Alliance wants all airlines to have facilities in place for passengers to check in online or using an automated kiosk and to be able to print a baggage tag at home or at the airport kiosk. Schwab said when Terminal 2 at London Heathrow used by the Star Alliance carriers opened in 2014, there had been a target of 70% of passengers using self-service transactions that had seemed ambitious at the time. "Many of our airlines suggested to us the customers wouldn't like it and they would prefer to have contact with the check-in agent and in their culture that they didn't want to deal with a machine, they want to deal with a person," he said. "Within a few months we found customers did indeed prefer the automated transactions and would step up to do it themselves." Schwab said airlines would still make customer service agents available to passengers having difficulty using automated check-in, but he expected further improvements in automation in the year to come. "We have to get all of the transactions on your smart device," he said. "We shouldn't worry about bad printers. You should just use your device and flash it. When we get to permanent bag tags in the industry that will be solved for."<br/>