Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

The satisfaction passengers feel in reserving cheap airplane tickets and discount hotel rooms is diminished at times by long lines at the airport. American Airlines is expanding its “Your Assistance Delivered Anywhere” program, where employees wander the airport with handheld mobile devices to help travelers with flight information, check standby lists, and check bags.

This program was kicked off last July at the Boston Logan airport. Given the positive feedback American has received, it has since added four more airports: Dallas/Fort Worth, Miami, New York JFK, and San Juan.

American Airlines believes that this program can help decrease congestion at their check-in counters as well as help increase their revenues. Agents are being located at security checkpoints to identify bags that are too big to carry-on and should be checked. American charges for each checked bag, thus increasing its income.

United Airlines started a comparable program last year at Chicago O’Hare airport with agents carrying handheld mobile devices working at customer service counters inside security checkpoints. They have since expanded this program to Washington Dulles and Denver airports.

United customer service roaming agents are able to confirm bookings, provide gate information and flight status.