Iata and its industry partners have successfully tested the first fully digital identity and travel experience on a journey from London Heathrow (LHR) to Rome Fiumicino (FCO) with British Airways (BA).
“Our vision for future travel is fully digital and secured with biometric identification. While the technology exists to do this at each stage of a journey, linking these steps together has proven challenging. Today with our partners we showed that it is possible. This will open up a world of possibilities for simpler journeys in the future,” said Nick Careen, IATA’s Senior Vice President for Operations, Safety and Security.
According to Careen, the testing illustrated the potential for a digitally integrated travel experience in the future.
The solution can offer travellers personalised offers through all shopping channels during their shopping experience. The LHR-FCO passengers were able to share their loyalty card data, stored as a verifiable credential in their mobiles’ digital wallets, with their travel agents. This allows airlines to use the NDC to make personalised offers through the travel agent channel.
Once the travellers had chosen their offers, the orders were generated as verifiable credentials that could be read as QR codes or stored in their digital wallets.
Additionally, digital passports, stored in the passengers' digital wallets, were used to assist passengers with confirming their travel document requirements.
The passengers also shared their digital passports and order data with BA to receive a confirmation that they were ready to fly and were able to complete seat assignments via text.
For travellers who chose to share their biometric data, proceeding hands-free was possible, as biometric gates cleared the way for passengers through security, into lounges and the aircraft.
“As an airline, we are always innovating and looking at ways to make the customer journey as seamless as possible. We introduced biometric boarding on selected flights earlier this year and it has been a huge success with positive customer feedback. Working with IATA on enabling a fully integrated travel journey helps us build on that and shows us what could be possible in the future,” said Dirk John, British Airways Chief Information and Digital Officer.
