DUBAI — Committed to getting the world safely traveling again, global leader in travel experience and loyalty Collinson Wednesday announced a trio of new initiatives to boost health and safety for airport lounge staff and guests and pioneer the new era of contactless journey for the airport.

The initiatives include a new set of global health and safety standards for airport lounges within the Priority Pass network, a new digital solution to enable more socially-distant and touch-free food and beverage ordering in the lounge, and a further digital enhancement to enable a more contact-free entrance.

Andy Besant, director of travel experiences at Collinson, said, “COVID-19 has radically altered what travellers need and expect from the airport journey. As a global leader in airport lounges and the travel journey, and operator of the market-leading airport experiences program Priority Pass as well as our own airport lounges under The Club and Club Aspire brands, we at Collinson are dedicated to developing new initiatives that ensure travelers feel safe and comfortable at the airport.

“We are now putting our unique passion and experience in travel towards developing robust solutions for airport wellbeing, which we believe is the best way to help drive a safe and effective recovery for the travel sector.”

Collinson’s global airport lounge standards

As the world recovers from COVID-19, health and safety at the airport will be key to rebuilding traveler confidence and championing the travel sector recovery. In service to this, Collinson is now launching a set of global health and safety standards for airport lounges. The standards comprise a number of recommended steps, including:

• Provision of PPE and increased health and safety training for staff

• Floor markers for social distancing in queues or other areas where people congregate

• New evaluation of furniture layout to adhere to social distancing guidelines while maximising space and allowing traveller groups to sit together

• Increased cleaning and disinfection using health authority-recommended products

• Switching air filtration systems to 100% outside air where possible

• Contact-free solutions where possible, including collection point options for F&B

• Removing print media and replacing with digital where possible

Collinson’s airport lounge standards were developed with input from the company’s in-house Global Medical Director Dr. Simon Worrell a specialist expert in virus management, immunology and communicable diseases, with over 20 years of experience in the delivery of international medical assistance and emergency care.

The standards will be implemented in all Collinson-owned lounges and recommended for use in all partner lounges across the Collinson airport lounge network, which comprises over 1,200 airport lounges in the market-leading programs Priority Pass, LoungeKey and Lounge Pass.

With the first set of global standards for airport lounges, Collinson encourages lounges around the world to use its standards as a robust foundation for an effective and safe travel recovery.

Contactless Digital Innovation

Collinson is spearheading the contactless airport journey via digital innovation to introduce safer, touch-free experiences into the airport lounge.

Collinson is partnering with Grab, the airport e-commerce platform and largest marketplace for contactless order and pay at airport restaurants, to launch a new pilot solution that will enable airport lounges to introduce a digital food and beverage (F&B) ordering solution.

The Collinson solution enables travelers to use their own smartphone or tablet to place their order for F&B available within the lounge and receive it via safe to-table delivery by a staff member or collect it from a dedicated collection point.

This will help airport lounges to continue offering a range of options to travelers in a more convenient and controlled manner.

Further evolving the contactless airport experience, contact-free entry is now possible at Collinson lounges, removing the need for members to touch the device to process their transaction.

Those using a digital membership card in the Priority Pass, LoungeKey or Mastercard Airport Experiences apps will have an entirely contact-free experience, while those using a physical Priority Pass or payment card will need to insert it into the device, but not touch the device in any other way.

Besant added, “Collinson fully supports getting the world safely travelling again to unlock the value that travel brings, both to the economy, as well as to society at large. At the same time, there’s no denying that the coronavirus pandemic has indelibly changed how we think about health and safety at the airport.

“Via Collinson’s airport lounge standards and our new digital innovation for a contact-free experience, we look forward to championing the travel recovery while making health and wellbeing a priority.” — SG