After Alaska Airlines announced last spring it would eliminate paper boarding passes from its airport kiosks, the restrictions are now in effect. To be honest, I’m now rather sanguine about these changes.
No More Check-In Or Boarding Passes From Alaska Airlines Airport Kiosks
As noted by One Mile At A Time, Alaska now warns that its airport kiosks no longer print boarding passes:
Our airport kiosks no longer print boarding passes—this means you’ll need to check in and access your boarding passes through the Alaska Airlines mobile app, from a computer, mobile device, or print them at home. If you’re checking bags, you’ll use our new bag tag stations to print bag tags, add a bag, or pay for your checked baggage. If you are unable to obtain your boarding pass before arriving at the airport, please see an agent for a paper version.
At least for now, Alaska is not charging if you require an agent to print the boarding pass.
Last April I predicted that Alaska’s decision to ditch paper boarding passes from its airport kiosks was a foolish one. At the time, I reasoned that many people still collect boarding passes for a variety of reasons…like no smart phones, as back-up, or as a souvenir:
I know I am not the only one who checks in online but virtually always stops at a kiosk to collect a paper boarding pass. That’s not to be wasteful, but because sometimes phones malfunction or there are gate agent shenanigans. Having a physical boarding pass is tantamount to an insurance policy.
Sure, Alaska is attempting to modify people’s behavior and it may well work (after all, everyone seems to have a smart phone these days), but I already see long lines every time I walk by the full-service Alaska counter at LAX. Does Alaska really think that line will diminish when check-in kiosks are eliminated? I am not convinced.
But almost a year later, I’m not sure I was right. As I’ve attempted to de-clutter my life, I’ve largely given up on paper boarding passes. Instead, I take screenshots of my mobile boarding passes. I also don’t delete old boarding passes from Apple Wallet (I’ve got over 1,000 of them…). Phones may malfunction, but I know I always have a screenshot of my boarding pass in case of any shenanigans. Apple Wallet auto archives expired passes, so there is not a lot of housekeeping.
I also found that if I go up to the attic and pull down my box of boarding passes, the ink on many of them has completely faded…what’s the point?!
It is true that some still do not have smartphones, but there’s always a lag when any new technology is introduced and I do think Alaska’s policy will impact behavior over time by reducing lines at airports and reducing clutter. Carriers outside the USA like Air New Zealand, Finnair, and Ryanair have similar policies and people seem to get along just fine.
CONCLUSION
Alaska Airlines has now eliminated the capability of printing boarding passes from its airport kiosks. While that will still shock a small segment of the traveling public, more and more I’m finding that the ease of using a mobile app and not having to fumble for a paper boarding is really the easier way to go. It’s almost liberating…I’m sure we all are going to survive the eventual death of the paper boarding pass.
@Matthew … What if I show up without a mobile phone ? What then ?
I’ve never owned a mobile phone , and I know others .
Go to the Alaska Airlines staffed check-in counter for bag drops and tell them you need a paper boarding pass. They will push out a paper one that can be used. They aren’t yet at what was the Ryanair-fee charging stage of demanding money to print out boarding passes at the airport.
@GU … +1 . Thanks .
For now at least, haraSSSSment flagging means Alaska Airlines check-in staff have to push out a paper boarding pass. I am curious to see how soon the TSA gives up on wanting to see paper boarding passes for their haraSSSSment-screening targets.
I went through some 20-40 year old boarding passes, and the older ones on hard card stock unsurprisingly held up better than the thermal paper ones and even some of the 20 year old hard stock boarding passes.
Like with the disappearance of passport stamps, the end of paper boarding passes will make it less likely for future generations to randomly stumble on figuring out where some of us have been. That said there are also digital wills for now that may help others piece together travel history to some extent . I can trace a fair amount of my grandparents’ diplomatic passport travels based on passport stamps alone without having to dive into national archives anywhere. Their boarding passes are long gone, and I would really have loved to have some of those since I know a bit about how they got around when there were extraordinary security considerations taken to reach some countries.
I recently found some 25 year old paper tickets that were never used — primarily CO ones, such as EWR-ORD for c. $800 in economy class. I was sort of surprised to see how legible they were after all this time.
What a contrast to stupid Southwest. I had to take the earliest flight to my destination and that happened to be Southwest. Traveling with my family of 4 their app allowed me to download all 4 boarding passes into my Wallet app in the iPhone. Got to the gate and the most unpleasant and obnoxious gate agent insisted that every passenger had to carry their own boarding pass. Well, my wife had her phone but my kids didn’t. He removed us from the line and made me find an agent to print the kids boarding passes so they could present their own to him. We were the last to board the plane and had to seat all separate. Never ever again will fly Southwest.
Wow. That’s horrible. Really poor service.
Truly obnoxious way for the airline agent to deal with that.
What I do is let the person without a smartphone to go a bit ahead of me and then I scan the mobile phone boarding pass for the other person. Then after they get cleared to board I then swipe to the boarding pass for myself and scan that. Done it for several passengers at a time and then too not had any fuss from the gate agents.
If it comes to this, one solution is to do a screenshot of all the boarding passes and then it’s easier to swipe left in photos as each member of the family goes through.
As I typed this, though, I thought to myself that perhaps boarding passes, even digital ones, should go the way of the paper ticket and perhaps have biometric ID at the gates.
Another 20th century thing is baggage tags. Can’t airlines start using Air Tags which would make tracking the bags a lot easier than bar codes which have reading issues? For first time passengers, SELL them an Airtag if necessary and throw one into the bag and off it goes.
That would end the kiosk/checkin experience for good.
Next, TSA should have a record of your flight on file including the type of ID you’re using. Simply scan in the ID at security, show your face, and walk through.
My home airport has a heavy Southwest presence, and we often don’t really have much choice in terms of which airline to use.
I have learned over the years that when traveling with the family on southwest, paper passes printed at the kiosk are the way to go. There are just too many ways for things to go wrong otherwise.
If you print the passes out at home or at the hotel, sometimes the print quality is deemed not good enough at the gate, and you get sent to the counter and lose your place in line, which on a southwest flight is a big deal. I saw it happen to someone just three days ago.
I know that the days of paper passes will come to an end and feel fortunate that my kids will likely be grown enough to handle their own passes by the time this comes to be.
Honestly I don’t know how smart that decision is, especially it is still more convenient to have boarding passes on certain international flights. Not to mention there are various codeshare flights!
Anyway, I can always request a paper boarding pass at the gate or at priority check-in desks.
It is not the end of the world but if there is a system breakdown, it will be interesting to see how Alaska can manage it now. I hope they have a backup plans and actually run a couple drills.
The way a system breakdown with the printers goes is that the airline/airline contractors manually write up boarding passes for each passenger. Can be very, very slow at times and been through a few such rounds over the years. If the access to PNRs goes down and they can’t get a print out or fax of the manifest of scheduled passengers for the flights, then sometimes they accepted already printed out ticket info or even digital evidence of being a passenger for the flight or they just refused to go until systems were back or they got a workaround to get back to flying passengers.
My preference has moved opposite that of Matthew’s. I was an enthusiastic early adopter of apps and digital boarding passes. However too many times since then have I had security people and even airline gate agents unable or unwilling to deal with digital boarding passes and insisting that I go get a paper one. Granted, that has never happened to me when flying Alaska, but the general lesson I have learned is to take a belt-and-suspenders approach and try to have both paper and digital.
To bring this back to the subject of the article and to concede Matthew’s point, my problems have not been when flying Alaska specifically, so there is that.
As a retired Air Canada gate agent I’m wondering what kind of shenanigans you are referring to.
I have exclusively used mobile boarding passes for probably a decade, if not more now, at least when available. I cannot recall a time, on any airline, where it “malfunctioned.” We live in a digital world and if you cannot or choose not to adapt, you fall into a very small minority of people that probably isn’t very profitable to the airline anyway. AS may be first, but others will certainly follow.
Interestingly, I think the AS app is inferior to the Big 3. It’s fairly functional, but in no way industry leading.
In the early days of boarding passes on the mobile phone I recall plenty of problems.
Many of these have been fixed now, but I remember that sometimes the phone would switch from portrait to landscape when applied to the scanner and the scan code would no longer be fully visible, and unable to be scanned. I remember watching this happen to lots of people causing delays.
Or the phone would be ready to be scanned but due to waiting around the phone would go to sleep right before needing to be scanned and then you’d have fumble around to pull it up again while holding up the line.
Or accessing the pass required cellular internet service and if there was bad reception at the point of scanning or a service outage folks couldn’t pull up their pass.
Of course there were hidden benefits too– since you put your phone face down on the scanner the gate agent couldn’t see your boarding zone, so using the phone meant that you could board in any zone you wanted.
Traveling with a couple of kids or a lap infant was either complicated or not possible with the phone. This has improved a LOT, but 10 years ago, you’d have done much better with some paper passes for 4.
Forgot to add, I still use a paper pass most of the time when traveling just because I find it easier.
I’m not tech averse and have used the phone and can do it, but I like to be fast going through TSA. I use Clear and PreCheck and I keep my phone in my bag when going through TSA. The only thing I have in my hand or coat pocket is my boarding pass, so I can go leave the TSA agent who checks the pass/ID and put my bag on the x-ray machine and then go through the metal detector without having to open the bag to store my phone.
As for me not being profitable to the airlines– I’ll guess that I am. I’m not going to pretend that I set any records with my travel, but I usually spend more than $25k on flights per year, usually I pay for a premium cabin when not on southwest.
Ditto!
This is dumb. Some (old-fashioned) people don’t even have a mobile application. Traveling from another country to the USA they will certainly give you a paper boarding pass.
Its just paper, It’s not like its plastic which does cause real waste and pollution.
Alaska’s only international is Mexico, Bahamas, Belize, and Costa Rica. These airports have been using mobile boarding passes for years. Mexico especially as LCCs dominate the domestic market, and more or less require you to check in prior to arrival at the airport.
The fed gov used to require a boarding pass in order to get reimbursed. I wonder if they have changed. Often They are way behind the times.
This is a revenue enhancement scheme (British vernacular).
Next, Alaska will $charge$ to print a boarding pass like a ULCC.
Next, Alaska will charge a processing fee for any services provided by ticket agents on top of the charge for each bag of luggage like other ULCC.
Next, Alaska will limit the availability of ticket agents like Spirit and the other ULCC.
Next, Alaska will further deflate all FF Miles like other ULCC.
Next, Alaska will charge for water and coffee like other ULCC.
Next, Alaska will charge for…..(fill in the blank)…..like other ULCC.
Do we see a pattern here??
No need for a cell phone with a facial recognition service of biometric access control… Berlin Airport requires nothing more than your smile to board the plane, as an example.