Scope
The 'Covid-19' pandemic has reminded us how interdependent we are; what happens to one person can soon affect many others, even on the far side of our planet. This was a very critical time where one has to follow the government mandates and lockdown policies to overcome this crisis. The airline industry has been hit extremely hard by the Covid-2019, crisis- even harder. But during this crisis early 2020 they started their operation with the following government mandates and lockdown policies considering the priority of passenger safety.
"It was very confusing & irritating for the passenger to carry all mandated documents while air travel during the pandemic time was quite tough, especially since everyday lockdown policies keep changing. It was also very challenging for the airport authority to keep eye on every passenger and monitor Covid-19 negative passenger onboarding".
Scenario at Airport
Observations & Challenges
Downloads/Okulicz-Rutkowska2021_Chapter_TheImpactOfCovid-19OnAirportOp.pdf
At the end of the first quarter of 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak became a fact, which almost completely suspended passenger air traffic around the world.
The Contactless machine is installed at the Airport to avoid contamination by viruses.
Passengers were confused about which document was carried or not and due to this, they missed the flight.
Government changes the norms & conditions policy every weekend. Carrying all necessary documents regarding traveling is another headache for the passengers.
The lack of procedures and unclear guidelines caused disarray at many airports.
Ground handling is a basic part of airport operations. Ground handling consists of the following service categories.
– Passenger service,
– Luggage service,
– Handling of goods or mail,
– Apron service,
– Aircraft service,
– Service for the supply of aircraft with propellants,
– Aircraft maintenance service,
– Support for operations and administrative activities related to the crew,
– Ground transport,
– Handling of in-flight supplies for aircraft.
It is necessary to quarantine the entire shift, which significantly reduces the work of the ground handling agent and requires more flexibility and shift work.
Storyboard at Airport (Post Covid-19)
Post Covid-19 Scenario
Passengers Challenges
Airport Authority Staff Challenges
User Storyboard
Aakash is a frequent traveler. Every time he has to travel and upload the test records according to the region. Aakash is traveling from New York To Shanghai.
He had all of the travel documents but doesn't have Covid-19 and also specific requirements for traveling to Shanghai. He has to go through different platforms to schedule one. Finally, he found one but that has no slots available. He thought he will some other time. He forgot this for some days and how he has a flight in two days and still doesn't have an appointment for Covid Test. At last, he got the appointments but other platforms took time to issue his test report and he didn't find the form as well. Unfortunately, he missed the flight.
Priyanka is traveling New Delhi to Dubai. She is very much excited for her trip.
She left her city with passport, covid -Ve report and all other required documents. When she reached New Delhi Airport she got to know she can't travel because she is not vaccinated and traveling to Dubai requires vaccination report. She argued with the airline staff and told them she did not receive any notification about it. This is totally their fault they should let her go. But airline staffs showed her how she ignored all the norms while booking the tickets. And priyanka realised that is her fault.
Major Pain Points
Every week every country's government were changing traveling guidelines
1). There was a fear in a air due to this they were not able to organise all the necessary documents on right time.
2). It was a period of chaos and confusion so, they were not able to concentrate on important information which is weekly circulated by the region's government about traveling guidelines.
3). They had to rely on multiple platform or source of medium for traveling document informations, which is another reason to miss the flight, due to missing of specific document for that region.
Re-Design Brief
Develop an air-ticket module where passengers can upload the vaccination report/schedule the covid test appointment against the booked tickets and work as a repository for vaccination records and much more. These features are going to be integrated with existing airlines company.