Congratulations to BA as it moves to its new home at London Heathrow Terminal 5.
As BA gradually vacates the space it occupies in other Heathrow terminals this is the catalyst for a spate of musical chairs ... with over 50 airlines moving terminal at Heathrow during 2008 and 2009.
Inevitably this is going to cause confusion for even the most seasoned of travellers. So, what can airlines do to ensure this transition runs as smoothly as possible for passengers?
I'm sure all the airlines will send emails to their passengers drawing attention to the terminal changes. Human nature says many of us will repeatedly re-check this information to reassure ourselves we're heading for the right terminal. So, we'll print the email ... creating extra paper to carry around ... and an extra document to potentially misplace.
It strikes me that there is a strong case for providing this reassurance information by SMS text message. We all carry our phones with us when we're travelling ... and having the new terminal details stored safely on our mobiles means no printing, no paper to carry, and hopefully less confusion all round.
2 comments:
BAA are offering an SMS service to customers already:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/gettingaround/heathrow/pdf/heathrows-changing-leaflet.pdf
This is free to customers. Just the flight number to 64222. Easy peasy.
It's good to see that BAA are offering this as a free service.
However, I wonder how many passengers travelling through Heathrow are aware of it?
My point about airlines (or travel agents) is they took your booking, so they know you are travelling, which means they could pro-actively provide the terminal information to you, without you having to request it.
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