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(15/03/23)
 Lufthansa has joined forces with SITA to explore ways
of improving the passenger
experience by digitally automating baggage re-flight operations,
thereby also reducing mishandled baggage costs.

Whilst much better today than it once was, mishandled baggage between two flight connections is a major pain
point for the industry, costing it billions of dollars each year.

The ability to address the issue of staff
shortages and baggage mishandling is of paramount importance
post-pandemic. Aviation lost around 2.3 million jobs during COVID
while recording US$2.2 billion in the cost of mishandled baggage
in 2022 – including over 4 million bags mishandled during
transfer.

“At Lufthansa, we have always looked at ways to optimize
baggage management processes and improve the passenger journey. We
see great potential in the automation of today’s mainly manual reflighting processes. This is why we have decided to work with
SITA to explore possibilities to digitalize the process,” said Viktoria Rudo,
Senior Manager, Lufthansa Group. “Based on
the first results of our Proof of Concept, we believe to be able
to automatically reflight as much as 70% of Lufthansa´s mishandled
bags at Munich Airport. Interpolating this to our global network,
we expect more up-to-date information and further improvements in
the mishandled baggage processes for Lufthansa and high potential
for other SITA airline customers by digitalizing what was
previously a totally manual process.”

SITA’s WorldTracer Auto Reflight is a digital
solution that does not require any human intervention, reducing cost and
inconvenience while contributing to industry efforts towards
sustainability and CO2 net-zero targets.

The solution also notifies passengers on arrival
of any delay with their bag, while collecting delivery details and
ultimately allowing the passenger to bypass the baggage hall.

The solution automatically suggests suitable
flight routing for rush bags (baggage not accompanying a
passenger) and uses the original bag tag to reflight and inform
the baggage system of the new routing. Time is saved, and
paper consumption is reduced, because there is no need to issue
additional rush tags.

SITA estimates that widespread automation of reflighting baggage could save the industry US$30 million a year
in costs associated with mishandled baggage.

Sergio Colella, SITA President for Europe, said,
“SITA’s automated baggage reflighting solution is built on the
back of past successful co-innovations with Lufthansa and meets a
critical industry baggage management requirement as we see the
return to the skies. Our aim to make sure that when a bag is
mishandled, it is reunited with its owner as soon and simply as
possible.”

See also:

Lost Bags and Airline Baggage Tracking – HD Video Interview with
Peter Drummond, SITA.

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