PAXboy
21st Apr 2009, 11:07
Air France is testing out what it claims is the first deployment of 'Near Field Communications' enabled mobile phone boarding passes.
The most well known example of NFC in the UK is the Oyster card used on the London Transport network.When an NFC device - such as a smartcard or a mobile phone - is passed within a centimetre of the reader, data is transmitted between the two.
As part of a pilot that will run until the end of October this year, frequent flyers travelling from Nice to Paris with the airline will be able to pick up their boarding pass by swiping an NFC-enabled phone over a reader at the airport.
The Pass and Fly system will identify the traveller through the information held on their NFC-enabled device and then upload the boarding pass to their phone. It will also tally the frequent flyer points the passenger has collected from the trip. Passengers will need to swipe their device over NFC readers once again when going through security at the airport and just before boarding.
The system is a joint project between Nice Côte d’Azur Airport and Air France, and uses technology from travel IT company Amadeus and transport tech vendor IER. Air France recently expanded its more traditional mobile check-in system. The service, whereby a boarding pass containing a QR code is sent by SMS, MMS or email to travellers' phones, can now be used for almost all short and medium-length flights run by the airline.
This is a very small scale trial because NFC phones are not yet available in any quantity, although all the major manufacturers have been working towards this for a number of years. As with all new technologies, it's a bit 'chicken-and-egg'.
The most well known example of NFC in the UK is the Oyster card used on the London Transport network.When an NFC device - such as a smartcard or a mobile phone - is passed within a centimetre of the reader, data is transmitted between the two.
As part of a pilot that will run until the end of October this year, frequent flyers travelling from Nice to Paris with the airline will be able to pick up their boarding pass by swiping an NFC-enabled phone over a reader at the airport.
The Pass and Fly system will identify the traveller through the information held on their NFC-enabled device and then upload the boarding pass to their phone. It will also tally the frequent flyer points the passenger has collected from the trip. Passengers will need to swipe their device over NFC readers once again when going through security at the airport and just before boarding.
The system is a joint project between Nice Côte d’Azur Airport and Air France, and uses technology from travel IT company Amadeus and transport tech vendor IER. Air France recently expanded its more traditional mobile check-in system. The service, whereby a boarding pass containing a QR code is sent by SMS, MMS or email to travellers' phones, can now be used for almost all short and medium-length flights run by the airline.
This is a very small scale trial because NFC phones are not yet available in any quantity, although all the major manufacturers have been working towards this for a number of years. As with all new technologies, it's a bit 'chicken-and-egg'.