A safe return of the inflight retail experience: How Retail inMotion is using tech to help tackle COVID-19

As the world’s leading provider of end-to-end passenger and crew service solutions, it is our main target to support the safe return to flying for both crew and passengers whilst also ensuring customers can continue to experience the necessities and luxuries of the inflight experience.

Retail inMotion has developed and deployed a number of key technologies, which naturally support the minimisation of crew engagement with passengers at all stages throughout the journey.

Pre-order/Pre-select

Our Pre-Select/Pre-Order solution enables passengers to select their preferred meal (Pre-Select) and purchase food/beverage and duty-free items (Pre-Order) in advance of their flight. The solution can be seamlessly embedded within the airline’s flight booking and check-in processes, as well as being delivered through a standalone e-commerce platform that’s fully branded to the airline requirements.

All major card payment types can be facilitated through the use of the Retail inMotion proprietary payment gateway (vPay), which then passes the transactions directly to the chosen payment acquirer of the airline.

Once confirmed, the order is sent electronically to the logistics operation of the airline. Through the use of RiM’s bar packing module (vPack), the airline can ensure that every order is packed, labelled and loaded correctly for each flight, thus ensuring an optimal passenger experience onboard whilst also reducing the required sales interaction time between crew and passengers when onboard.

With the RiM Point of Sales solution (vPos), the cabin crew member onboard can use their mobile device to view the active list of pre-orders on an interactive seatmap, together with any special dietary or other relevant passenger information. Pre-order delivery is confirmed by the crew member and onboard inventory counts updated accordingly.

Earlier this year, Retail inMotion introduced the pre-order and pre-select solution for Alaska Airlines. Read more about it here

Order2Seat

The extension of the pre-order solution to the in-flight phase of the passenger journey has been developed through the Order2Seat module of the RiM solution. Through onboard Wi-Fi and the integration with the onboard Inflight Entertainment Provider, Order2seat enables the passenger to browse, select and pay for products and services directly from the comfort of their own device with minimal cabin crew interaction.

Whether it is offering the passenger the ability to browse and order from the food and beverage menu onboard or select a third party activity at their destination, the Order2Seat module provides the airline with full control and visibility of the retail experience onboard whilst ensuring the passenger has optimal choice and comfort to order in their own time. Once the passenger places an order, an automatic notification is delivered to the cabin crew mobile device onboard indicating that a product has been ordered and the payment has been successfully processed. The crew member can then prepare the product for delivery to the passenger, if required.

Contactless Payment

As we have seen in recent months, contactless payments have become the cornerstone of a safe and convenient retail experience; this will be especially true for the inflight retail experience of both passengers and cabin crew.

Retail inMotion’s proprietary payment gateway technology (vPay) has underpinned the successful worldwide rollout of our inflight retail solutions for the last 15 years. As payment technologies have advanced at an increasingly rapid pace, Retail inMotion has responded and enabled the acceptance of these evolving payment types for our customers around the world.

With all Hardware and Software products being fully contactless payment enabled, we have been able to support an increase in use of our contactless solution whilst also providing the airline with complete control and management of the contactless transaction limits, fraud management and refunds processes, as needed.

Digital Inflight Receipts

Retail inMotion has deployed a digital receipts module (vReceipts) for a number of our customers throughout Europe, Middle East, Asia and the United States. The solution allows for a paperless cabin onboard, thus reducing the hardware costs for the airline as well as providing an environmentally conscious solution to passenger requirements to access a physical copy of their receipt. As the transaction is completed onboard, the details are automatically saved to the passenger’s record and are immediately accessible after the flight for all transaction types including cash, card and voucher payments.

Digital receipts also enable a more efficient sales process onboard for cabin crew enabling them to serve a high volume of passengers, maximising inflight retail revenue even on short sector routes.

For us at Retail inMotion, the top priority is to support airlines with a fast implementation of our various solutions. All the key technologies mentioned above naturally support the minimisation of crew engagement with passengers at all stages through the journey. Right now, our efforts go toward supporting the safe return to flying for both crew and passengers while safeguarding and enhancing the passenger experience on board. 

 

Are you looking for a solution that is tailored to your airline’s specific needs?

Are you interested in learning more about Retail inMotion’s tech capabilities?

Contact our team to hear how we can become partners!

Tomasz Adamczak

Tomasz Adamczak

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