TSA eyes 'Randomizers' to sort security lines
#47
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: Boca Raton, FL
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Posts: 561
Ok. I saw The Randomizer today at FLL. It is an iPad running the app. The app has blue screen and it actually says TSA Randomizer on it. The iPad is installed in between the Pre and regular lanes. The TSA clerk first asks how many people are traveling together and then touches the screen. The iPad the shows a big white arrow pointing to either lane. There were also like 5 other TSA clerks of different caliber standing around and telling people what to do.
#48
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: PHX
Programs: AA Ex Platinum & 1MM, DL PLT, Marriott Gold, HH Diamond
Posts: 2,490
Ok. I saw The Randomizer today at FLL. It is an iPad running the app. The app has blue screen and it actually says TSA Randomizer on it. The iPad is installed in between the Pre and regular lanes. The TSA clerk first asks how many people are traveling together and then touches the screen. The iPad the shows a big white arrow pointing to either lane. There were also like 5 other TSA clerks of different caliber standing around and telling people what to do.
#50
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 3,526
In ABQ if you tell the smurf manning the Randomizer you are traveling with someone you are automatically sent to the NoS (apparently the tewwowists only travel in groups ) Those traveling alone & sent thru Pre, from the Randomizer, then have to get past 3 smurfs doing hand swabs (I refer to them as 'waste, fraud, & abuse' or WFA for short). After getting thru the Pre WTMD, there is still about a 50% chance of being randomized for another hand swab-I've actually seen at least one guy getting swabbed by WFA & again after the WTMD
#51
Suspended
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TSA has publicly gone on record and indicated that their plan is as follows: as enrollment in DHS "trusted traveler" membership programs increases, the randomizer and other "managed inclusion" approaches are to correspondingly decline.
Not a surprise, but it's becoming quite clear that the "managed inclusion" is being sold to some as a TSA cost-saving move. TSA head-count reductions are facilitated by this, but that may mean even slower PreCheck lines.
Apparently fourteen hundred employees and some 20-25% of FAM field offices are slated to be eliminated.
This mentions some of that: http://www.businessweek.com/articles...ors_picks=true
Not a surprise, but it's becoming quite clear that the "managed inclusion" is being sold to some as a TSA cost-saving move. TSA head-count reductions are facilitated by this, but that may mean even slower PreCheck lines.
Apparently fourteen hundred employees and some 20-25% of FAM field offices are slated to be eliminated.
This mentions some of that: http://www.businessweek.com/articles...ors_picks=true
#53
Join Date: Nov 2008
Posts: 3,657
I don't think TSA requesting less money is implausible. Given the almost totally negative publicity TSA has been getting, and increased hostility to TSA starting to develop in Congress, TSA might've been facing a much larger budget cut. If TSA gets out ahead of the story and requests a small cut in its budget, and says "look, we're making cuts, we're being responsible", it might save TSA from even deeper cuts --- whether or not those deeper cuts would be appropriate.
#54
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Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Northeast Kansas | Colorado Native
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Randomizer was in use at DTW North terminal last weekend. I skipped right to the front of the TDC for PreCheck, but pax randomized into PreCheck each got a hand swab. Took maybe 2 mins to go from TDC > grabbing bags off the X-ray belt.
#55
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Baltimore, MD USA
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards. Tha... that's about it.
Posts: 4,330
I don't think TSA requesting less money is implausible. Given the almost totally negative publicity TSA has been getting, and increased hostility to TSA starting to develop in Congress, TSA might've been facing a much larger budget cut. If TSA gets out ahead of the story and requests a small cut in its budget, and says "look, we're making cuts, we're being responsible", it might save TSA from even deeper cuts --- whether or not those deeper cuts would be appropriate.
#56
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: Boca Raton, FL
Programs: DL MM, DL DM, Marriott PP
Posts: 561
The new setup in Terminal 2 at FLL has 2 lines both going to Precheck. There is the randomizer installed in between of those lines and TSA clerk is randomizing people between the two lines. Last time I was there both lines were empty but he still hit the randomizer and sent me to one of the lines saying they are both the same anyway.
#57
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Houston, Texas
Posts: 959
The new setup in Terminal 2 at FLL has 2 lines both going to Precheck. There is the randomizer installed in between of those lines and TSA clerk is randomizing people between the two lines. Last time I was there both lines were empty but he still hit the randomizer and sent me to one of the lines saying they are both the same anyway.
They buy this fancy "randomizer" (because they can't keep themselves from "profiling") and it chooses which of the two lines to send the passengers through, which both have the same level of "security" theater?
TSA = What a JOKE!
#59
Join Date: Nov 2008
Posts: 3,657
2) I think the TSO may have been trying to make a subtler point --- frankly, the same point that many here make. Passengers who go through the PreCheck line are no more likely to cause a terrorist event aboard an aircraft than passengers who go through the "ordinary" line. In that sense, both lines provide the "same" level of security.