Delta Airline is one of USA’s most reliable and trusted names. The airline has always been at the forefront of innovation. Only last year, it introduced automated security screening lanes to reduce wait times. Delta has also incorporated Radio Frequency Identification (RIFD), a process where transmitters are added to the tags thus enabling the airline to track baggage in real-time. This year again, Delta has announced to go beyond the traditional, and put innovation to work for the convenience of its passengers.
The airline company has revealed its testing of the first biometric-based baggage drop system in the USA. The experiments are bound to happen in summer at the Atlanta-based airline’s hub at the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport. The experiment will have four new automated baggage units, out of which, one unit will have facial recognition feature that is programmed to match the customer’s face with the picture on the passport. The automated baggage drop lanes are meant for passengers checking in through the self-service check-in kiosks. The kiosk will print out a tag, which the passenger will fix on the bag prior to taking it to the bag-drop counter. The three automated units will have a Delta agent to check the passengers’ credentials against their IDs. The biometric unit, however, will be completely based on self-service. Passengers will have to scan their passport at the machine, which will then use the facial recognition technology to for identification. Initially, the passengers using their passports as IDs will be able to use the service.
This new automated baggage system will bring huge relief to passengers as well as the Delta employees. The automatic baggage unit will ensure the passengers don’t have to wait for hours for their credentials to be checked. Instead, the automatic system will have the speed and precision to process almost double the number of passengers in an hour, as compared to the traditional manual checking system.
The four machines required a whopping $600,000 investment from Delta. But the company sees it as a major step towards creating a fast, customer-centric service portal. The self-service baggage drop lane will not only make the checking process smoother for the passengers but will also enable the Delta employees to focus on a more thoughtful and proactive customer facilitation approach.
