Wireless In Travel – Hype Or Necessity?

By Allan Rotich Posted 03 May 2006 @ 05:23 pm EET     Print     Reprint     E-Mail     Comments

Nairobi (IBTimes.com) - Internet-enabled mobile phones are believed to play a crucial role in the proliferation of the mobile Internet. The definition of the mobile Internet is quite simply the use of wireless technologies to access the Web and network-based information from mobile devices, such as personal digital assistants (PDAs), mobile phones (WAP-enabled), notebooks and new emerging devices. The promise of "immediate, anywhere and anytime" web access, location-based and personalized services are the key advantages of the mobile Internet.

The mobile Internet follows closely on the heels of the PC-based Web, which has already transformed the travel industry. From the customer’s perspective, the Web has been able to squeeze long-standing inefficiencies out of the travel industry’s value chain. While a traveler once had to either go through a travel agent or coordinate across multiple providers in order to arrange a complete itinerary, he or she can now turn to a Web-based provider such as Orbitz or Travelocity for trip planning services.

The necessity of mobile technology kicks in once the traveler sets out for the journey. At this point, they do not have the luxury of a desktop computer back in the office or at home. As a result they would benefit a great deal from mobile access to content like flight schedules, departure gates and airport conditions.

NCP is one of UK’s largest car park companies. The company’s call centres and online reservation systems handle thousands of advance bookings per month, ensuring those rushing to the airport are not stuck without a parking space. Customers are sent their booking reference numbers either by post, fax, email, or it is given to them directly when they use the call centre. But NCP found out that it spent too much time and money using such “traditional” means of communication. There was a high risk of the traveller not getting a confirmation in the post!

In their quest for a cost-effective means to get more direct confirmations to customers, they found that ‘send to mobile’ software, provided a shortcut to their fulfillment process. What do they do now? They simply text the confirmation. It reduces mailing and fulfillment expenses by thousands of pounds every year, and gives customers a positive view of NCP as a whole.

Any traveler runs the risk of flight cancellations or delays. Dubai International Airport (www.dubaiairport.com) has a service called SMS Flight Notification. The passenger simply sends an SMS with the flight number to the airport and the current details for that flight are forwarded via SMS to the passenger’s mobile phone. Passengers can also query the SMS system to find out the carriers and flights available on this service. Simple but works like magic. It is important for the traveler to have access to this information immediately and not when they reach the airport. This will save both the traveller and travel company valuable time and money.

If you have been to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport of late, you will admit that both the airport and airlines stand to benefit a great deal by eliminating the check-in inefficiencies characterised by long queues. These could be a thing of the past if and when mobile check-in using passenger cell phone moves up the airlines’ priority list. Mobile check-in requires travelers to use their mobile phone to register for the service through the airline’s web site. Following the registration process, the airline then transmits an alert to the traveler’s mobile phone, asking if he or she is ready to check-in. The alert will depend on the individual’s preferences that were set during registration. For example, the service could alert passengers based on time, say, three hours before a flight, or based on their proximity to the airport.

Once the traveler checks in (including selecting a seat), the service will send a two-dimensional bar code to their cell phone, which can be scanned at a self-service kiosk at the airport to print out the boarding pass. Depending on the security policies at the airport, the SMS bar code can actually serve as the boarding pass, eliminating the need to print the same.

Benefits for passengers are not so much in saving time as in creating efficiency. Because you can check-in before arriving, the time at the front of the airport comes down to getting the boarding pass, which takes a few minutes. There is an implicit plus for airports because passengers will have more non-queuing time, meaning more time to spend in shops, restaurants and bars generating revenue for the airport. For the airlines, it means faster, better and cheaper passenger processing.

Upon arrival at destination, mobile location-based services provide invaluable benefits to travelers. For example, a traveler approaching Nairobi can benefit from a wireless directory provider who provides information about the city’s main tourist attractions, restaurants, unscheduled events, hotel information and availability, and make reservations by pushing a button on his handset.

So, is mobile in travel a reality or just hot air? Considering that mobile operators in Europe and Asia are working day and night to streamline delivery of TV content to their subscribers, the SMS-based mobile travel technologies discussed here can safely be considered ancient.

This is not to imply that deploying mobile technologies in travel will be simple. Infact, the challenges that await us are many and include slow speeds, primitive phone browsers, small displays, limited data-input capability, and high connectivity costs. But as the saying goes, if you find a road with no obstacles you will probably find that it doesn’t lead anywhere.