Paper Boarding Passes Are Better
The slightest user experience (UX) issues relentlessly vex me, thus, boredom is, for better or for worse, a mysterious concept. With all my recent travels, airports are now the ultimate contemplative UX playground for me. I admire the effort put into creating a hassle-free experience.
For example, digital boarding passes were developed to make boarding easier. Yet, I’ve gone back to paper as my primary medium.
Digital boarding passes represent a design flaw; we focus only on the screen. Lazily digitizing paper brings a level of complexity in physical spaces. It was apparent that the UX designers did not consider the physical boarding journey for the traveller and more importantly, airport staff.
Paper can easily be slotted between the picture pages of the passport, which turns into a clever folder. Every time you hand the “folder” to check-in staff, they implicitly know how to handle the documents. Unlike digital passes, you have to fumble your phone and passport in separate actions. Moreover, the scanners sometimes fail because of low brightness, fingerprints, and smudges on the screen. Consequently, airport staff and fellow travellers now wait longer to accommodate you.
Although I still use a digital boarding pass as a backup; the paper boarding pass tucked in my passport is now part of my primary boarding process. The decision was not about me, it was for others. If I can provide any reprieve to airport staff and my fellow travellers, then everyone wins and I can focus on other UX annoyances (lol).
Wound count: 250
Internet slang terms used: 1/250
Twitter: @bhavprajapati
