A Travelport study has revealed that 55% of US business travellers are willing to pay for travel upgrades out of their own pocket and 80% prefer to have direct control over their plans. While the majority of those surveyed would use their own money or loyalty points to pay for airline seat, hotel, car hire and Wi-Fi upgrades, 85.7% said their companies cover the cost of ancillaries like inflight Wi-Fi, additional bags and meals. Business travellers also want to know what products are on offer, with 70% saying that they want to receive personalised advertising, based on their previous purchase history and interests. Fast-track security and border clearance products were popular, with 85% belonging to schemes like TSA Precheck and Global Entry, even though 16.8% said their companies do not reimburse them for these services. <br/>
general
There is a glimmer of hope that the frustrating, slow airport security experience will get a little smoother over the next few years. In a partnership with American Airlines, the TSA introduced a new kind of machine last month to screen carry-on bags in Terminal 8 at Kennedy International in New York. The machines, the agency says, improve on the current system, in which most travellers have their carry-on bags screened by X-ray machines that produce only two-dimensional images of their contents. If agents are unsure of what they’re seeing, they pull the bag aside and inspect its contents manually. With the new machines, the TSA says, security agents will be better able to analyse what is inside a bag and will be less likely to have to perform searches by hand. <br/>
Passengers arriving at London Heathrow had to queue at passport control for up to 2.5 hours in July, official figures showed, sparking further criticism from aviation chiefs about delays caused by Britain's border regime. The Border Force missed its 45-minute or less target for passport check wait times for 95^ of visitors from outside the European Economic Area on all but 1 day last month. Queues were longest July 6 when non-EEA visitors had to wait for up to 2 hours and 36 minutes at Heathrow, Europe's busiest airport. The boss of Virgin Atlantic called the queue times "unacceptable", adding to criticism from the CE of British Airways, who said last week that Heathrow's queues were worse than at other major world airport. <br/>