Smooth Sailing at Klia During Cny Peak Period

12-Day Festive Period Saw 3 Million Passenger Movements and 1.3 Million Baggage Handled At KLIA

SEPANG - Malaysia Airports handled a total of 3 million passengers inKL International Airport (KLIA) during the recent 12-day Chinese New Year (CNY) peak travel period from 14 to 25 February 2018. Daily average passenger movements soared from 160,000 during the normal period to 250,000 this CNY.

Malaysia Airports had continued to show visible improvements at theoperational level despite the surge in passenger numbers. Daily airport operational efficiencies for the various improvement plans lined up to address 24 touchpoints in a passenger’s journey were also tested at both terminals in KLIA. These 24 touchpoints include baggage flow, immigration queueing time and public amenities such as toilets.

According to Malaysia Airports managing director, Datuk Badlisham Ghazali, many initiatives aimed at enhancing passenger comfort levelwere planned and carried out during the recent CNY period as the airport anticipated that the increase in passenger movements will also result in heavy usage of the various facilities. He said, “One initiative was to ensure that our Baggage Handling System (BHS) was in top form. We had put in 33 additional staff to monitor and ensure that airline check in staff were handling the checked-in baggage properly. This is important to avoid mishandled baggage that will cause disruption to the conveyor system. Additionally, we had ten extra staff during the day shift and five during the night shift to handle any baggage overflow in the system.”

“We had also provided comprehensive refresher and familiarisationtraining sessions to more than 1,000 airline ground handlers. Penaltieswere also imposed on any handlers who had failed to follow our BHS Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). Manpower for baggage handlers was in full force – there were nearly 800 baggage handlers on duty during the CNY period. As a result, one of the most visible improvements seen during the period was the drop in the percentage of mishandled baggage rate from 0.07% in January to 0.03% in February. This meant that there was smoother and faster baggage delivery during the CNY period. We handled 1.3 million baggage during this time so it was really important for us to minimise potential issues that may be faced by passengers because every little detail matters,” he added further.

Since the beginning of the year, Malaysia Airports had embarked on a year-long series of improvement initiatives for its facilities and services at KLIA. To date, the following improvements were done to enhance passenger experience - implementing additional immigration counters to shorten queueing time, working in tandem with authorities to prevent congestion at the pick-up and drop-off lanes, introducing towing zones and installing bollards to prevent unlawful parking by the roadside, improving awareness on security screening procedures, and installing anti-slip rubber mats in the toilet cubicles for a more comfortable experienceamong many other initiatives. The public is able to get weekly updates on these improvement initiatives through Malaysia Airports official social media platforms.