In the news: Apps for Apple Watch, Travelport’s solution for airport express services, SITA new solution to track airlines’ baggage
Innovative apps from airlines and hotels to keep time with Apple Watch
Apple Watch, a mini computer on your wrist. (Image credit: apple.com)
At the launch of the much anticipated Apple Watch at the March 9 Apple “Spring Forward” event in San Francisco, the company’s chief executive Tim Cook called the device “revolutionary”, as it could be used to open hotel rooms, be your health checker, and even replace your car keys.
It seems that almost every other company and brand want to be part of the watch’s ecosystem for, as revealed during the event, thousands of new apps have already been developed for it ahead of its sale on April 24 in nine countries –Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, the UK and the US.
Among them are social network Facebook, photo and video sharing app Instagram, app-based car-hiring service Uber, Chinese messaging app WeChat, and the social magazine app Flipboard.
So it is not surprising that airlines and hotels want a piece of the pie too.
Air New Zealand is among the first airlines to jump into the act with an app which, with just a shake of your wrist, enables you to order a cup of coffee.
The watch app will feature the popular coffee-ordering function first introduced on the airline’s mobile app in 2014. It automatically invites customers to order their coffee as they enter the lounge, and alerts the customer when it is ready to be picked up from the barista station.
The airline’s customers with the Apple Watch will also be able to receive flight information and notifications on their device including boarding calls, a departure countdown feature and their electronic boarding pass.
Meanwhile, Starwood SPG app for the Apple Watch puts keyless entry on the wrist for its special guests. Come April 24, Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) will be able to open their room door using the watch by holding it up to a lock pad near the door handle.
The app will be similar to the hotel group’s mobile phone app, which allows guests to use their mobile phone to check-in and get the room number. The keyless features are present for its Element, Aloft and W hotels.
The watch app also allows guests to access details including check-in, checkout, confirmation number and room number; check Star points; get notification with hotel address upon arrival to the city; stay details at the hotel; and contact the hotel for requests and questions.
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) is offering service of a different kind – translation on the go with the IHG Translator app – for owners of Apple Watch.
With the app you will able to translate a foreign language on your travels by just looking at your wrist.
The app adopts the most popular features from its mobile predecessor, allowing users to “travel like a local”, whatever their choice of device.
By speaking directly into the watch, or selecting from a range of pre-loaded common phrases, travellers will be able to translate from English into 13 different languages, in real-time. The app will cover the nine initial launch countries for Apple Watch.
Translations will appear instantly on the screen of the device in the chosen language, giving users the chance to read the word or phrase, with the help of phonetic spelling. Formal, casual and slang settings will also be available.
To coincide with the launch of Apple Watch, IHG is making the IHG Translator app available to all users of the new device free of charge.
IHG Translator is available in 13 languages – Castilian Spanish, French, German Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Thai.
Travelport offers solution for airport express services
Travel agents can book airport express services. with Travelport. (Image credit: pelucco_iStock)
Travelport has launched a first of its kind solution, which allows airport express services to be offered to travel agency customers using a plugin on Travelport’s Travel Commerce Platform.
Heathrow Express is the first customer to have signed up to be part of the service, which is now live.
The solution means travel agents can now book electronic tickets for Heathrow Express using Travelport’s point of sale solution, Travelport Smartpoint.
In addition, travel agents will be able to offer travellers the same priced tickets on Heathrow Express services as those buying direct.
The application also
• enables multiple airport express service providers connectivity through a single application;
• provides all available classes of service to the agent;
• offers electronic ticketing; and
• automatically integrates PNR data.
Stephen O’Hara, Travelport’s director of rail, said, “We’re having extremely positive conversations with other airport express services all over the world and hope today’s announcement will be the first of many.”
SITA BagMessage tracks a bag like a parcel
Airlines can now track a bag like a parcel with SITA BagMessage (Image credit: SITA)
Every day airlines and airports exchange information on the location of passengers’ baggage. SITA has harnessed the 2.5 billion data messages, which it manages for the global airline and airport community in its BagMessage service, to provide smart solutions that allow bags to be tracked like parcels.
BagMessage is the global, fully-managed and secure message distribution service that is used by more than 220 airports and 500 airlines around the world to do this.
Nick Gates, SITA portfolio director, baggage, said: “We are delivering this service to our community via an application programming interface (API) to allow airlines and airports to integrate it into to their existing systems quickly and easily, including services such as mobile updates which they might offer to passengers.”
SITA said its baggage tracking offering is unique because BagJourney, which provides accurate information on the current location of passengers’ baggage, is integrated with WorldTracer – the global tracing and matching service of delayed bags. This allows a bag’s journey to continue to be tracked even if it is mishandled.
Keeping track of passengers’ bags is a priority for the air transport industry but it will become even more important in the coming years, as airlines and airports prepare to implement IATA’s new resolution 753.
This resolution, which comes into effect in 2018, requires IATA member airlines to monitor and log the status of its passengers’ bags through the major stages of the bags’ journey. One of the biggest consequences will be that inbound (arrival bags) will need to be more actively tracked/monitored.
