Nobody does it better
BEST AIRPORT WORLDWIDE
1 Seoul Incheon (ICN)
2 Singapore (SIN)
3 Hong Kong (HKG)
4 Central Japan (NGO)
5 Halifax (YHZ)
BEST AIRPORT BY SIZE
Fewer than 5 million passengers
1 Halifax (YHZ)
2 Ottawa (YOW)
3 Guayaquil (GYE), Ecuador
4 George (GRJ), South Africa
5 Southampton (SOU), UK
5 – 15 million passengers
1 Central Japan (NGO)
2 Tel Aviv (TLV)
3 Austin-Bergstrom (AUS)
4 Houston Hobby (HOU)
5 Jacksonville (JAX)
15 – 25 million passengers
1 Taipei (TPE)
2 Zurich (ZRH)
3 San Diego (SAN)
4 Moscow Domodedovo (DME)
5 Vancouver (YVR)
25 – 40 million passengers
1 Seoul Incheon (ICN)
2 Singapore (SIN)
3 Minneapolis St. Paul (MSP)
4 Detroit Metropolitan (DTW)
5 Shanghai Pudong (PVG)
Over 40 million
1 Hong Kong (HKG)
2 Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW)
3 Beijing (PEK)
4 Denver (DEN)
5 Bangkok Suvarnabhumi (BKK)
Asia-Pacific airports once again dominated ACI’s annual Airport Service Quality (ASQ) customer satisfaction awards with Incheon picking up the Best Airport Worldwide award for the fourth successive year as the region’s gateways won seven of the eight global categories.
In addition to the top honour, all-conquering Incheon was also voted the world’s best gateway handling between 25-40mppa, No1 in Asia-Pacific and received a special Airport People Award for the courteousness and helpfulness of its staff.
Singapore Changi and Hong Kong International Airport’s second and third rankings respectively in the Best Airport Worldwide category – Nagoya’s Central Japan International Airport was fourth – means that Asia-Pacific gateways have taken the top three spots for four years in a row.
Other top performers from the region in 2008 included Central Japan (Best Domestic Airport and Best by Size in the 5–15mppa category); Hong Kong (Best by Size in the over 40mppa section); Taipei or Taiwan–Taoyuan (Best by Size in the 15–25mppa category) and Beijing Capital, which picked up ACI’s Best Improvement award.
Abu Dhabi and Doha finished second and third respectively in the Middle East while top five rankings were earned by Beijing (3rd) and Bangkok Suvarnabhumi (5th) in the over 40mppa section and Singapore Changi (2nd) and Shanghai Pudong (5th) in the 20-40mppa category.
All received their awards at a spectacular gala dinner held at the Palácio de Bolsa during ACI Europe’s recent Airport Trading Conference and Exhibition in Porto, Portugal (See pictures).
Incheon’s president and CEO, CW Lee, admits that he likes that ‘winning feeling’ and wants to experience it again next year, assuring rival airports that he will not allow his staff to get “big-headed” or complacent on customer service after four highly successful years.
“We're going to try harder to make this an airport the whole nation can be proud of – an airport admired by everyone worldwide, and the airport setting the standard for all other airports around the world,” insists Lee.
Lee is certainly generous in his praise of the airport’s staff, claiming that Incheon’s ASQ success was only made possible by everyone “working together towards a better future”.
The airport was highly praised for continuously making improvements and satisfying expectations of many travellers, the opening of its new Concourse A and AIRSTAR shopping mall helping it achieve an average satisfaction rating of 4.91.
Its various cultural and artistic events also proved popular with passengers. ACI Asia-Pacific’s regional director, Maggie Kwok, enthuses: “I am very proud that in the ASQ Award 2008; four of the five top performing airports in the world are from the Asia-Pacific region.
I believe the first impression is always important and airports are often the first point of contact when travellers visit a country. “You should never let your airport to be seen as understaffed, unfriendly, inefficient or untidy.
If the airport receives a high rating from the travellers, it will attract more passengers who will be willing to spend more time in the airport and to spend more money and therefore it is crucial for us to keep up a high standard.
I encourage all airports to keep up the high standards in customer service and to seek continuous quality improvement.” ACI director general, Angela Gittens, says being named Best Airport Worldwide Award once again is a “remarkable achievement,” particularly when considering the ever-growing list of airports competing for its crown.
Says Gittens: “I congratulate Incheon International Airport on winning ACI's Best Airport Worldwide Award for the fourth consecutive year.
This is a remarkable achievement, particularly when you consider the other excellent airports that participate in the ASQ Survey. Incheon has set the benchmark for service excellence.
“There are many impressive airport terminal buildings around the world, but ultimately it is the dedication of the airport staff that ensures that facilities are clean and serviceable, that processes are efficient, and that staff are courteous and helpful to the passengers.
Passengers rate Incheon very highly in all these aspects.
I thank IIAC for providing this role model of service quality to the industry.”
Nagoya’s Central Japan International Airport (or Centrair as it is known locally), has also come out and praised the efforts of airport staff in helping it scoop its two awards as well as a best ever fourth place ranking out of over 100 competitors bidding for the title of Best Airport Worldwide.
“The awards recognise the united efforts of all our personnel,” it said in a statement.
“Our aim remains to be the number one airport in the world for customer satisfaction.”
Airport Authority Hong Kong, operator of Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA), believes that the quality of service offered at the gateway sets it apart from its rivals.
“One can’t have good customer service without people dedicated to delivering it. At HKIA, this means a team of 60,000 plus airport staff working in unison to create a total travel experience,” says a spokesman.
“To foster a service-orientated culture at HKIA, an airport-wide service excellence programme – the Customer Services Excellence Programme (CSEP) – is conducted every year to enhance service quality and promote smooth collaboration among the airport community.
“The programme comprises a series of workshops and seminars that invite members of the airport community to share and learn how to enhance customer service.
Individual achievements and team spirit in customer service are also recognised in every year’s CSEP award, during which outstanding cases and employees of customer services are selected among nomination from organisations of the airport community.”
Acting Airports of Thailand (AoT) president and Bangkok Suvarnabhumi director, Serirat Prasutanond, claims that his gateway’s top five ranking in the over 40mppa category and 28th position in the Best Airport Worldwide – a rise of 13 places on 2007 – clearly shows the progress it is making.
Prasutanond hopes that Bangkok Suvarnabhumi will become a top 10 airport this year by further improving the gateway’s “atmosphere, cleanliness, facilities and services as well as passenger safety”.
Abu Dhabi Airports Company (ADAC) claims that Abu Dhabi International Airport’s high ranking in the Middle East is testament to its commitment to customer service.
Sheikha Al Maskari, vice president of corporate affairs, enthuses: “We are always looking at ways to improve. We aim to deliver services and facilities above and beyond passenger expectations.
To this end, we endeavour to hire, train and retain exceptional personnel for our airport, from frontline working facing customers every day to operations and facilities management staff.
This award can be attributed to the hard work of all our airport employees. “Some credit must also go to the airport expansion and the redevelopment work taking place at the airport.
The refurbishment of Terminal 1, the facelift of Terminal 2 and the phasing in of the new Terminal 3 are important projects, which have improved both the passenger experience and the facilities we offer our partners.
“These developments are all part of a larger redevelopment programme currently underway which will ensure our high quality standards are upheld even as passenger traffic continues to rise in line with the development of Abu Dhabi as a destination for commerce and tourism.”
ACI says the awards once again emphasise the importance the world’s top airports place on the provision of a spotlessly clean terminal and a relaxed, open, friendly ambience.
The 2008 survey also revealed that comfortable waiting areas, good signage and clean, readily accessible washrooms were high on the agenda of the travelling public and that the winning airports all scored highly in these categories.
The top performing airports in other regions were Zurich (Europe), Guayaquil, Ecuador (Latin America & Caribbean), Tel Aviv (Middle East) and George, South Africa (Africa).
The only by size category not won by an Asia-Pacific airport was for airports handling less than five million passengers.
This was won by Halifax, with the Canadian airport pipping Ottawa and Guayaquil to the honour. Gittens believes that Beijing Capital’s Best Improvement Award was well deserved.
“I am pleased to see that passengers have recognised the considerable efforts that Beijing made in opening a new terminal and enhancing its services during the year and the important role it played in facilitating the very successful Summer Olympic Games,” she says.
“Their success in mobilising the entire airport community in their customer service improvement initiative resulted in significant improvement in passenger satisfaction scores in the ASQ Survey.”
A reliable monitor of airport service, ASQ is used by many airports as one of the key performance indicators of the airport’s service.
Indeed, ASQ data is often linked into service level agreements, concession agreements, privatisation agreements and remuneration contracts all over the world.
The 2008 results were based on the findings of over 200,000 questionnaires completed by passengers at 108 airports. The survey captures the passengers’ perception of the quality of more than 30 aspects of service that they have experienced at the airport.
Interviewing covers every day of the week and every month of the year to ensure coverage of all seasons and all peaks and troughs. To be eligible for the annual rankings, an airport must participate during all four quarters of the year.
Adds Gittens: “As the industry benchmark of airport service quality, the ASQ survey programme is enabling airports to understand and respond to the needs of their passengers.
“Results show that overall passenger satisfaction continues to improve year-on-year. This reflects the importance airports are placing on customer satisfaction and the innovation in services that we are seeing worldwide.
The programme continues to grow, which demonstrates that airports care very much about their customers, no matter how tough the economic situation.”
Asia-Pacific Airports 2009 Issue 2
Fast tracking service
Jim Martin, managing director of ARINC’s Asia-Pacific Division, considers the impact emerging technologies are having on operational efficiency and customer service levels at airports.
In recent times, we have witnessed many key drivers of technology in the aviation industry, amongst them new regulatory requirements, competition and innovation.
The airline and airport industries have successfully leveraged on the latest technologies to create new passenger friendly systems and enhance operational efficiencies.
From a regulatory standpoint, initiatives such as IATA’s Fast Travel has taken a broad view of the aviation landscape and proposed a series of technologies that will help enhance the passenger travel experience.
These measures include self-service check-in and efficient baggage handling systems.
Innovation has also brought about new technologies such as Passenger Reconciliation Systems (PRS), and hand-held portable devices with the ability to issue boarding passes and meal coupons.
Self-service platforms such as mobile phones and the Internet have had some of the biggest impact on passenger processing methods since Common Use Terminal Equipment (CUTE) was introduced.
A mobile phone and, in recent times the smart phone, have become a passenger’s must have device even while travelling and has created new services for travel bookings and remote check-in.
And the impact on airports has been, and continues to be enormous, as it has allowed them to save floor space that could be used for other services such as generating ancillary revenues.
The environment also stands to benefit, as mobile passenger processing will create a paperless environment, saving costs and reducing pollution.
Ultimately, passenger flow through airport terminals will become smoother as mobile phones enable passengers to keep track of their flight status and airlines can potentially locate delayed passengers.
And mobile and Internet check-in processes will be supported by a suite of remote check-in technologies and products, that can extend to hotels, convention centres and ferry terminals.
For example, multi-channel check-in offers airports several options for passenger and baggage processing, such as web check-in, remote check-in and common bag drops.
Another emerging technology that airports can consider is ‘roving agents’. These portable, hand-held devices enable airline staff to issue boarding passes to passengers standing in long queues at check-in counters.
The ‘roving agent’ has the ability to speed up the check-in process for passengers, and potentially save costs by reducing the number of check-in counters at the airport. These devices are also able to issue meal or hotel coupons for passengers if they need to be re-accommodated due to a flight delay.
As passengers become more accustomed to self-service check-in, a natural progression will be to introduce self-service baggage checks to complete the experience. In time, self-service kiosks and common bag drop counters will become standard features at hotels, resorts and convention centres, providing greater convenience for passengers.
With the implementation of 2D barcode boarding passes and the rise of remote check-in capabilities, security measures have to be taken to ensure that duplicate or fake boarding passes are identified in real time.
Passenger Reconciliation Systems (PRS) enable airline and security officials to read and verify information from a boarding pass against an airline’s Departure Control Systems (DCS) for real time validation.
One of its biggest advantages is that it simplifies the security procedures that are also conducted manually by the airport security staff.
The growing concern about aviation security has opened debates on how the aviation community can address the needs of facilitating safer travel for passengers.
Countries such as the US and parts of Asia-Pacific have taken a series of measures to implement key components of Electronic Borders, such as Advanced Passenger Information Systems (APIS) and Passenger Name Recording (PNR) to potentially eliminate terrorism threats, drug traffickers and other ‘wanted’ passengers from departing on an aircraft.
The APIS works on the basis of an airline sending messages to government security agencies to assess the eligibility of passengers before they can board an aircraft. The APIS dedicated message would comprise of a passenger’s flight information, their names and passport numbers among others.
The format of the message would be in either the UN/EDIFACT or any other user defined format. Meanwhile, the PNR specialised application is a front end collection and correlation system used to obtain passenger information from airlines and transmit it in a standard format for a customs department. There are no requirements for a standardised message from an airline host system.
Apart from Electronic Borders, the PRS has become an added dimension to the security portfolio within an airport environment.
IATA’s study in 2008 on the adoption of 2D barcodes revealed the importance of scrutinising a passenger’s boarding pass from landside to airside in an airport. This was important to filter duplicate boarding passes, validate barcodes on boarding passes and verify a passenger’s status.
The beginning of this article identified how regulatory initiatives, evolving industry requirements and innovation have been driving some of the new emerging technologies while supplementing it with different examples. However, while new technologies can be adopted, the aviation community would need to have a thorough understanding of passenger requirements and how these technologies can realise them.
The industry has done a successful job of harnessing Internet and mobile technologies into their operations, and the next steps are to assess what other new and innovative services can be introduced to enhance the passenger experience.
While technology has been adopted at a furious pace in the industry, it is also important for airline and airport staff to learn how to use them effectively. This is imperative as airports and airlines have become commercial entities, and are competing with themselves for the passenger dollars.
IT systems have become mission critical components that need to be monitored and maintained regularly. In conclusion, the aviation community needs to be constantly and acutely aware of evolving passenger requirements to ensure effective implementation of emerging technologies.
Operationally, airports need to work with their IT vendors and business partners to understand what the new technologies are and how best to leverage on them.
It is also important to ensure that there is a long-term plan in place to ensure the optimal adoption of such technologies in enhancing passenger satisfaction and profitability.
Asia-Pacific Airports 2011 Issue 1