Don’t people just print their boarding passes at home before they leave for the airport? Or worst case, use the kiosks at the airports which print passes? Very few of the passengers in line ahead of me are using their phones.
I don't trust apps, I don't mind using them for stuff that doesn't matter much, like parking og supermarket loyalty programs. For travel information, absolutly fucking not. I print everything. At the airport I mostly see people using their phones as boarding passes, I absolutely refuse to do that, I have zero trust that that will work as well as the paper boarding passes.
I really hate that the basic cost for participation has gone up, a smartphone and quality internet (in the USA) can be a significant cost.
But I've never had a problem with a screen capture of a boarding pass, and I've found the Apple wallet to work as well. The airport kiosks are good for printing out the pass when you check in, or even for just printing if you checked in on-line 24 hours prior.
I usually print a boarding pass at the airport kiosk — I always have luggage to check anyway, and there's then no concern if my battery dies etc.
But at the automatic gates to security, and at the boarding gate, I think the majority of people having trouble scanning their boarding pass are using a phone. For those elderly people who can't scan a paper boarding pass, the staff can immediately help — but they're much less able to help scan a barcode on a phone, which might be set too dim, be turning to landscape mode, etc.
I mean, they do demonstrably work. And if for some reason yours doesn't, no big deal, just walk two feet over to the gate desk and ask them to print you one.
I prefer to use mobile boarding passes so I don't have to waste paper, and don't have to keep track of yet one more thing while traveling. (I'm already bringing my phone, so I have to keep track of that regardless.)
Printing a boarding pass at home works for the flight out. But what about the returning flight?
Just last week I flew back home from SFO. I needed to change the flight at the last minute. The app failed to update with the new flight. The airline had removed all the boarding pass kiosks from that airport and only seemed to have luggage drop service. I asked an airport employee how I could get a boarding pass printed, and he pointed to a poorly-marked lane with a sign about "special accommodations" or something, like I was blind. I waited in that line for about 20 minutes along with people who were trying to check their bags. Eventually I got to someone who seemed really put out that I hadn't checked in yet and that they'd need to push a few more buttons on their computer to do that for me.
Weird, I've flew out of SFO two weeks ago on United, and their online check-in never works for me so I just do it at the airport and get a paper boarding pass. I didn't run into any issues. Line was short (mid morning on a Thursday). They have a bunch of self-service kiosks to check-in and print passes.
It's never crossed my mind that an airline app exists and I would never consider installing one. If they don't want to provide self-service kiosks or a working website, I guess they'll have to have more demand for agents. Same with banks: there's no check deposits through their website, so I go in person when I need to do that. Installing an app is just not even on my radar to consider.
I'd also never rely on a gate number from my phone anyway knowing that it could be out of date. I'd have to verify with a departure board or sign at the gate anyway, so I'm just going to start there.
That's what I do, because phones are too fiddly and I don't want to have to deal with unlocking it and finding wherever the barcode went off to when it's my turn to check in, but my wife does something with an app instead and seems to like it.
Perhaps that's the thing with an app my wife is doing. I don't have a wallet app, myself; I mistrust phones (and the corporations which own them) too much for that.
Depends where you are and which flights. Around me, maybe 60% of people use mobile. From the other 40%, some probably got their paper tickets when they checked in their baggage and going with that now.
> boarding passes at home before they leave for the airport
It’s been years I’ve heard or seen anyone doing it. Even my parents in their 70s get theirs at the airport.
> I don't think most people worry about that at all. Why wouldn't it be available? If you're heading to the airport from home, your battery is charged.
You're assuming the phone works and the internet connection works and the app works and the service behind it responsive. That's a lot of trust in thousands of moving parts.
Meanwhile I have a printed boarding pass which depends on nothing other than me having it in my pocket, so it basically 100% fail-proof.
While I always use the paper boarding pass, I do also check the boarding pass on the app out of curiosity. Easily like half the time on the American Airlines app, when I'm at the gate about to board and click on show boarding pass, the app hangs for many minutes and never responds. I'm always glad I have the paper boarding pass in my pocket instead.
> You're assuming the phone works and the internet connection works and the app works and the service behind it responsive
At check-in (24 hours before my flight), I add the boarding pass to Google Wallet. From that point, displaying it doesn't require an internet connection, or having to rely on the airline's often-shitty app.
Yes, the phone has to not be broken, but that's a pretty low bar: in my 15 years of owning smartphones, my phone has been broken and unusable for perhaps a grand total of a few days of time (so under 0.01% of the time). Yes, Google Wallet has to be functioning, but that particular app being broken would be an unusual, surprising occurrence.
And if by 0.01% chance, I can't get the boarding pass off my phone for some reason, I can always go to the check-in desk or kiosk or gate and ask them to print me one.
> Meanwhile I have a printed boarding pass which depends on nothing other than me having it in my pocket, so it basically 100% fail-proof.
I've never lost a phone before, but I have lost paper boarding passes on more than one occasion.
The point is that the mobile boarding pass is a nice convenience (especially with the auto-updating gate number on it), but the ability to get a paper boarding pass printed is never far away if the mobile one fails. So why not just use the mobile one, and save some paper, and the need to keep track of one more item?
Maybe I'm weird, but when I go on a trip, I generally pack my smartphone, if I bring it at all. It would be a royal pain to go find it again when I get into line to board.
Same, I do recognize that walking around without a smartphone starting to become "weird" to others though. I don't mind being weird.
I live in a major US city and get hit up for cash by the homeless sometimes. When I explain I do not have a cellphone to them when they ask for money through some cash app. They look bewildered. Just 20 years ago I was the only one carrying around such a device for IT reasons. Now I am putting limits on my digital life, and it makes me socially "weird".
OTOH
Currently, the only thing I don't pay regularly by using a smart device, are bus fares, which are a solved problem, my city just hasn't implemented that yet
Everything else, I can either use a digital wallet for, or an instant bank transfer (Which I've been given to understand are a bit more of a hassle in the US)
I'd basically never expect to be without a device for an extended period of time, specially not in an airport
I am aware of the single point of failure though, so I do take particular care of not running out of battery, keeping an accesible spare, and some cash around for emergencies I just never use it
Almost nobody carries around small cash or change anymore.
And social services provide the homeless and those in poverty with free smartphones, since they're far more effective at ensuring communications with social services.
So how is the world weird? It all seems quite rational and reasonable to me.
I won't call it "weird", because generally I like the idea that some people aren't actually glued to their phone at all times, and don't even have it handy.
But I will call it unusual, because the vast majority of people will have their phone in their pocket or purse while at the airport.
Ryanair (3rd largest airline in the world) insists on people printing their boarding pass like this, or using their app. They save money by needing fewer terminals at the airport.
> It's often €50 now to print boarding pass at the counter in Europe.
I was about to respond, "No way this is true. I don't believe you." But then I found an article claiming that yes, indeed you can be fleeced like this for simply showing up and asking for your boarding pass. Unreal.
Depends on where you are. My experience in American airports is almost all apps, but Spain's Iberia, for example, is basically all paper, typically printed by the airline and not even someone at home. So for them, minimal changes over how flying worked in the 1990s.
Just US domestic flights. Most people just have the paper passes. They are guaranteed to work. And I guess I just assumed everyone with a computer had some sort of printer. If not, how do they, you know, print things out? I use my printer constantly for things like forms I have to mail, printing out documentation to read later, hobby stuff…
You act as if the same QR codes scanned on your phone don’t work. Even if your phone dies or something happens, the gate agent can still print out your ticket at the gate.
What are you printing off and mailing so often?
Any documents you I don’t want to read on my phone, I read on my iPad.
> If not, how do they, you know, print things out?
I didn't have a printer until a few years ago (my now-wife really wanted one, so we got one). I do appreciate having it when I need it (easier than going to FedEx office), but I still very rarely have to print something out. I do really like that the printer has a built-in scanner; I've used that much more often than to print something.
> Most people just have the paper passes. They are guaranteed to work.
I've definitely had paper boarding passes that just wouldn't scan (probably from a faling airport kiosk printer), or a pass that had torn and even holding it together just right, it still wouldn't work.
I don't think I've ever had a mobile boarding pass that wouldn't scan, though of course there are other things that can go wrong, like the phone itself not working, which isn't a failure mode of paper passes.
But whatever, if my more-convenient, non-paper-wasting mobile pass doesn't work for some reason, I'll just go to the gate agent and ask them to print me one.
At a certain point, low-cost airlines become high-cost, at least in time and annoyance. I have a cousin who insists that Sprit saves him money, and every family holiday his plane is delayed or cancelled, and he had to fly to a different city and drive to where we are.
