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Airlines move towards more self-serve options for passengers

Published: 10 November 2010

Plane passengers are getting less for more, consumer advocates complain, as airlines move toward getting flyers to tag their own bags, while charging for a second piece of luggage.

Karl Moore, a professor in McGill University's Desautels Faculty of Management, says the main motivator for airlines is the cost savings in an industry where it's a struggle to remain profitable.

"Airlines like it because a positive benefit accrues to them: they don't have to hire people," he said.

Palmer said WestJet anticipates the self-serve options will reduce the number of people it needs to hire going forward and that eventually it won't be necessary for passengers to see a person to check in.

But Moore believes customers also don't mind doing more for themselves if it speeds up the process.

"We're much happier to get a ticket from a machine because it's faster," he said. "The lines at the kiosks are shorter than to interact with a human being.

"Sometimes we prefer to deal with machines because they're efficient and they don't roll their eyes. Companies love them because they don't go on strike or for lunch and work 24 hours a day."

Read full article: Calgary Herald, November 10, 2010

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