Hyderabad becomes first airport in India to enable e-boarding for international flights

GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd (GHIAL) is the first and only airport in India to offer truly end-to-end paperless e-boarding to all its domestic passengers across all flights. Now, GHIAL has started rolling out the digital solution to international flights, becoming the first airport in India to do so. This marks a significant milestone in the history of Indian aviation.

In line with the government of India’s Digital India campaign, GHIAL’s international e-boarding service ramps up safe travel options for international passengers choosing to fly out of Hyderabad International Airport (Rajiv Gandhi International Airport – RGIA). The service is currently available for select international flights of IndiGo Airlines. Hyderabad International Airport rolled out its e-boarding services for international flights after the government’s nod based on a rigorous and successful pilot.

As a key partner to this initiative, IndiGo Airlines became the maiden carrier to commence this facility when their Sharjah-bound passengers e-boarded themselves from Hyderabad on the 6E 1405 flight on 2 October 2020. Other scheduled international carriers operating out of Hyderabad are in the process of integration with the airport’s e-boarding system, which will be rolled out soon.

Pradeep Panicker, CEO, GHIAL, said: “Leveraging tech-enabled solutions to continuously elevate passenger experience is our key focus area. In Iine with this, we are delighted to announce that after about five years of successfully operating e-boarding for domestic flights, we have launched the e-boarding solution for international operations as well – another first for any Indian airport. In the present scenario of the pandemic, automating the passenger journey provides more pleasant airport experience. After the successful pilot of the project and all regulatory approvals, we have used our internal capabilities to take up e-boarding solution for international operations. Implementation of successful e-boarding at RGIA is outcome of the collaboration with cross functional teams and all stakeholders, including our key partner IndiGo. We are confident that very soon we will get all our international carriers operating out of Hyderabad onto our e-boarding platform.“

The e-boarding solution is fully backwards-compatible, and passengers would be free to choose between using conventional paper boarding passes or electronic boarding passes on their mobile phones to use the system. Some of the key benefits out of international e-boarding include: 

• Enhanced passenger experience as its helps in reducing queue waiting time at the airport
• As an advance security solution, e-boarding removes redundancies at check points
• Helps airlines to optimize their processes and improve their resource utilisation
• The real time data availability of all passenger check points helps airport to continuously enhance its operational efficiency.
• Enhances overall safety and security of airport.