30 / THOUGHTS ON TRAVEL
Trapped
travel
Whilst our industry strives to create the best experience for passengers onboard, other elements of the travel product remain unpredictable. April Waterston talks to travel industry experts to discover their views
D
ecember 9, 2021 marked my first long-haul flight since COVID took hold. I was practically giddy with excitement to board the plane, grinning ear-to-ear from take-off to landing. I savoured what previously I might have taken for granted: scrolling through the IFE, the drinks service, choosing my meal. Ultimately those eight hours were well spent soaking in the onboard service – for me, the joy of travel was back at last. Here at Onboard Hospitality we’ve been championing the inflight experience as an essential component in reinvigorating the ‘joy’ of travel for the past 18 months. However, despite my favourable experience onboard, overall I found the travel experience to be incredibly stressful. The rapidly changing rules for testing and quarantine caused many a headache, and collating the correct proof of vaccines, tests and
so on was trickier than I had expected. Even with the VeriFLY app at hand, the amount of research needed to ensure I was doing the right tests at the right time, and trying to source the correct documents all from my mobile device was less than ideal. Considering my job keeps me at the for front of the latest necessities to travel, the fact that even I struggled to travel confidently led me to sympathise with passengers who may be less clued up and seriously put off booking. Everything the onboard sector does is with the passenger experience in mind. But, ultimately, the passenger experience is far further reaching than just the time onboard. With that in mind, I spoke to two travel industry experts and fellow journalists to explore wider sentiment among business and leisure travellers from the UK – seeing this as something of an indicator of global trends – and asked what more can be done to support a smooth recovery.
onboardhospitality.com
Thoughts on travel v9.indd 30
1/18/22 04:55 PM
