Jetstar to roll out SMS boarding passes from February

Jetstar will introduce SMS boarding passes for domestic Australian and New Zealand passengers during the first quarter of the year, CEO Bruce Buchanan told a conference in Singapore on January 28.

The boarding pass technology will be trialled first on Sydney-Avalon flights from late February, with a staged rollout to follow on other domestic services in Australia and New Zealand throughout 2010.

Developed by Melbourne based company Sissit Group, passengers will have the option when booking to receive their unique boarding code through a standard text message. The message will then be ‘read’ by a specialised scanner at the airport before issuing a paper boarding pass.

In addition, Buchanan said that the airline had already started automatic web check in earlier this month. “Automatic check-in for the airline’s Australian and New Zealand domestic services allows passengers at the time of booking to choose to check-in and have their boarding passes automatically sent to them via email 24-48 hours before flight departure,” Mr Buchanan said.