During the early autumn there has been plenty of discussions in news and other media about Helsinki Airport and the long queues in the security check lines. The queues were caused by application of the new regulation by the EU saying that only 100ml of liquids in one container were allowed. Finavia had installed earlier modern security screening equipment which made it possible to accept also bigger liquid containers to get through the security check. Therefore now it was merely a step backwards especially in the security screening process optimizations at Helsinki Airport. The queues were formed.
The queues at the security screening area is not a new thing. Just after pandemic there were long queues reported at Amsterdam Schiphol airport. This was because the airport had let go a big amount of the security screening personnel during the pandemic and they had not had time to recover from that. Recruiting security screening personnel is not a rapid process. Something similar happened at Helsinki Airport then and also now with the new regulation.
Airports have a very good understanding about the passenger amounts at each time period in various hot spots like the security screenings or border control. The airports are using this data to plan the resources and work force usage throughout the day so that the processes would be smooth and easy. So what could go wrong?
Security service providing is expensive. It is labor intensive and needs personnel throughout the day. The working hours and the salaries are not very good and it means that changes in personnel are common. The airport operator is in charge of the service providing so it does not matter whether the personnel in in-house or outsourced. In this situation the means of resilience like reserving excess amount of people for shifts, having excess amount of people employed, improving work shift structures or improving benefits and income would help solve difficult situations.
Saving from this kind of a function is tempting for the airport operator. Building resilience is especially expensive so preparing for special situations might not be the target that the airports would aim at but going to the other direction meaning that the under resourcing is chronic, can not be the target. But how does this seem from the customer perspective? Or in fact, who is the customer?
Looking at the income sources at airports the two main areas are the aeronautical revenues which are paid by the airlines as airport charges for the usage of the airport, and on the other hand the non-aeronautical revenues which are paid by the passengers through shops, restaurants and other commercial service providers. So on the other hand the customer is the airline and on the other hand the passenger. The airlines pay for the security screenings and thus they are expecting the process to be smooth. However, there are no service level agreements between the airlines and the airports. The passengers have no saying to the security screening queues since they don´t pay for them directly but through the airline in the ticket price. Legally the passenger is the airline customer.
Airlines are suffering from a high cost structure. Airport charges are one of the cost items and thus the airlines are urging the airports to save costs leading to decreased airport charges. Therefore the cost areas like security screening services are looked critically by the airports. But if the security screening process becomes too slow it starts affecting the departure punctuality and causing passengers to miss their flights.
Then we have a third group that in this context can be understood as customers. Many airports are companies. Companies have owners and the boards. The corporate law says that the task of the company is to make money for the owners. This is of course natural, but if we are talking about a monopolistic business which the national main airports typically are, increasing the profits at any cost becomes questionnable. Even though the airport might be competing with some other airports as a destination, it is still the only option for the local passengers to use aviation services. So the owners have to take into consideration also the fact that airports are not in an open market.
In the end, if the processes fail, the only suffering customer is the passenger. The airport can say that they did not cause the queues in purpose; it was an accident. The airlines can say that the passengers have to be at the airport on time so that they can reach the flight. The owners of the airport do not comment. There is no law or regulation that would protect the passenger in a situation where the slippery soap moves from hand to hand. The situation gets even worse if the airports and the airlines start blaming the passengers for the queues and missing their flights. That is exactly the point where the passenger experience is lost totally. And that is the point that needs actions also from the regulators.
Picture by Pixabay
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