CHECK-IN CAPACITY OPTIMISATION

Overview

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Heathrow airport and the airline community wanted the entire STAR alliance carriers to operate out of the new upcoming T2 but there wasn’t sufficient capacity at check-in to accommodate.  It was unclear if transaction times were optimised in the existing facilities which would mean that some carriers could not move to T2, or whether transaction times could be reduced. 

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Approach

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• Engaged with airlines and ground handling / check-in stakeholders seeking their approval to analyse the existing operations.

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• Created a data collection plan.

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• Collected transaction time data for passengers at check-in which included reasons for high transaction times.

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• Identified and validated process root-causes.

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• Generated ‘what-if’ capacity models to demonstrate the terminal occupancy options if process problems were resolved.

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• Worked with stakeholders to identify and implement new ways of working which linked with the new operating model for T2 common user check-in.

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Outcome

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• The analysis identified that overweight bags was the largest contributor of high transaction times.

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• When solutions were implemented to address root causes the transaction time reduced by 20%.

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• In this application, the reduction in transaction time was used to optimise capacity which enabled the entire STAR alliance to operate out of T2, which also minimised both OPEX and CAPEX.  Similarly, the improvement could have been used to increase service levels to passengers in a different application.