The first e-ticketing kiosks should be operational at South African airports towards the end of this month, says international airports IT outsourcing group SITA.
This SITA should not be confused with SA's State IT Agency that uses the same acronym.
Speaking at the world launch of SITA's Annual Airport Trends IT Survey, in Cape Town, company officials explained that the roll-out of common use self-service (CUSS) kiosks had been delayed by about a month in order to solve interoperability issues.
"There were some issues concerning the specifications and how they were interpreted, but those seem to have been resolved," said Catherine Mayer, SITA VP of airport services.
CUSS kiosks use Java as the Web-facing application. The kiosks have touch-screens and customers will initiate a session by touching the logo of the airline they want to travel on. SAA and Mango are the first South African airlines that will use the system.
Khodr Akil, SITA VP of sales and relationship management for Africa, said the concept of e-ticketing, where customers electronically book an aircraft seat over the Internet or from an electronic kiosk, has been slow on the Africa continent, but is beginning to catch up with the rest of the world.
"There is a greater interest in doing business in Africa and, therefore, there is a lot more demand for greater convenience for booking tickets," he said.
More CUSSing at airports
In its survey results, SITA said 25% of responding international airport management companies plan to use CUSS kiosks, compared to only 9% in last year's survey. Some 70% of such kiosks are currently dedicated to a single airline, but this proportion is expected to move to a 40/60 split over the next two years.
"This suggests that airlines and airports are starting to acknowledge the benefits of sharing infrastructure and costs," noted the survey.
SITA stated that many airports, internationally, are planning IT projects that support passenger self-service, such as self-boarding at gates, mobile passenger check-ins and kiosk checkout, but that investment in security is of equal importance.
More than a quarter of the respondents indicated they are considering using biometric technology by year-end for employee access control, but using such methods for passenger control has been much slower, the survey added.
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