Passenger Security Screening Process Improvement

In order to fully understand the opportunity and make informed recommendations, o&i consulting conducted a detailed operations measurement exercise in Stansted Airport’s live passenger screening operation. Breaking down the security process to look at each individual element from queuing through to the repack / clearing area, we observed each area during busy periods across a week.

Detailed analysis of the data collected, combined with our observations, identified the key constraints and opportunities for improvement. It also became clear where equipment was not performing as well as it could, and where resource could be utilised more effectively or work methods improved.

Fulfilling the core requirements of the brief, our team provided the client with a detailed understanding of its operation, describing current usage and productivity of each element of the security process. We identified a direct correlation between throughput and periods of low productivity and, through our analysis, were able to feedback the key causes of this.

o&i’s recommendations directly addressed these opportunities for improvement. The client received a set of solutions to optimise the end-to-end screening process, encompassing the pre-screening area prior to boarding card check and the queue maze. Our solutions targeted the key causes of low productivity as well as making a series of incremental gains to improve the overall process and throughput levels. Taking a holistic view, we looked at the effects of increased throughput in one area on subsequent areas of the process and how these areas could be further improved or changed to handle the higher demand.