Changes to screening in light of recent failures
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 3,526
Changes to screening in light of recent failures
http://tinyurl.com/o5a3p4q
No shite.
FliesWay2Much was correct when he said passengers were going to pay for the TSA's failings.
Ain't gonna happen, Neffenger.
Jason Harrington, who joined the T.S.A. as a screener at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago in 2007, said he was stunned by the agency’s seemingly ever-changing priorities.
“One day it was, ‘We want to thoroughly check everybody, even if the line is backed up to the ticket counter,’” said Mr. Harrington, who left the agency in 2013 to attend graduate school and wrote an article in Politico the next year about his experience with the T.S.A. “But a short time later, it was, ‘We have to get these people through the lines.’”.....
“One day it was, ‘We want to thoroughly check everybody, even if the line is backed up to the ticket counter,’” said Mr. Harrington, who left the agency in 2013 to attend graduate school and wrote an article in Politico the next year about his experience with the T.S.A. “But a short time later, it was, ‘We have to get these people through the lines.’”.....
FliesWay2Much was correct when he said passengers were going to pay for the TSA's failings.
Mr. Neffenger said the agency would be cutting back on using the managed inclusion programs, though he said he planned to push to get more passengers into the Pre-Check program.
#2
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: DFW
Posts: 28,099
TSA can't fix the screening problems as long as the employee problem isn't addressed and they screen for non-threats.
Removal of shoes, belts, and light outerwear is a procedure looking for a problem that doesn't exist. WBI is another bottleneck that should only be used for secondary screening and as GAO has recommended the BDO program should be ended and those screeners either returned to screening duties are discharged as excess.
Neffenger might make a difference but I won't be holding my breath for anything that improves the passengers experience when encountering TSA.
Removal of shoes, belts, and light outerwear is a procedure looking for a problem that doesn't exist. WBI is another bottleneck that should only be used for secondary screening and as GAO has recommended the BDO program should be ended and those screeners either returned to screening duties are discharged as excess.
Neffenger might make a difference but I won't be holding my breath for anything that improves the passengers experience when encountering TSA.
#3
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: where the chile is hot
Programs: AA,RR,NW,Delta ,UA,CO
Posts: 41,668
TSA can't fix the screening problems as long as the employee problem isn't addressed and they screen for non-threats.
Removal of shoes, belts, and light outerwear is a procedure looking for a problem that doesn't exist. WBI is another bottleneck that should only be used for secondary screening and as GAO has recommended the BDO program should be ended and those screeners either returned to screening duties are discharged as excess.
Neffenger might make a difference but I won't be holding my breath for anything that improves the passengers experience when encountering TSA.
Removal of shoes, belts, and light outerwear is a procedure looking for a problem that doesn't exist. WBI is another bottleneck that should only be used for secondary screening and as GAO has recommended the BDO program should be ended and those screeners either returned to screening duties are discharged as excess.
Neffenger might make a difference but I won't be holding my breath for anything that improves the passengers experience when encountering TSA.
One of the problems with TSA's self-styled 'consistent inconsistency' approach is that it affects TSOs and their performance as well as passengers.
It's one thing if the pax doesn't know the rules from day to day; s/he gets barked at and gets belongings confiscated. When a TSO knows the rules are whatever s/he decides, is it really surprising when the outcomes are unpredictable?
Neffenger might have had greater success if he had simply insisted on consistent attention to the agency's mission instead of diverting attention to drugs and large sums of cash and breast prostheses and expense perfume bottles and cool light sabers. Instead, he's choosing to follow in his predecessor's footsteps, believing that an unpleasant checkpoint experience is an effective checkpoint experience.
The fact that he hasn't shut down employee cellphone use at the checkpoint says volumes. Does this guy ever fly? Does he actually observe what's going on?
#4
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: DFW
Posts: 28,099
Chollie, you're pointing out what I see as an employee problem. Poorly trained, improperly supervised staff making it up as they go is a serious issue that TSA needs to tackle. Allowing this only makes the public less cooperative and that makes the work of TSA all the more difficult.
I don't think anyone can turn around TSA as long as the current 2nd level leadership is in place.
I don't think anyone can turn around TSA as long as the current 2nd level leadership is in place.
#5
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: An NPR mind living in a Fox News world
Posts: 14,165
I wonder how much airport authorities paid to modify their terminals to install all the Extortion-Check areas in the first place? How much more are we paying them in increased parking fees and retail prices to pay for all of it? I guess money was no object in the effort to silence the TSA's most vocal critics.
#6
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: where the chile is hot
Programs: AA,RR,NW,Delta ,UA,CO
Posts: 41,668
Chollie, you're pointing out what I see as an employee problem. Poorly trained, improperly supervised staff making it up as they go is a serious issue that TSA needs to tackle. Allowing this only makes the public less cooperative and that makes the work of TSA all the more difficult.
I don't think anyone can turn around TSA as long as the current 2nd level leadership is in place.
I don't think anyone can turn around TSA as long as the current 2nd level leadership is in place.
1) Forcing taxpayers to pay bloated prices to the same people who apparently failed to train TSOs properly in the first place is not the answer. Will this take place at the TSA Academy?
What other job (civilian or government) responds to massive employee failure by giving those employees paid time off from regular duties to attend 're-training'?
2) Yes, there are problem employees, but the majority are higher rank than TSO. LTSOs, STSOs, and suits all stand around the checkpoints jacking their jaws and playing with their cellphones. TSOs still have no central source to turn to for questions about whether or not an item is to be permitted or how it is to be handled. Massively over-staffed checkpoints (compared to much of the rest of the world) and longer lines (again, compared to much of the rest of the world).
Behind every under-performing or flat-out corrupt TSO, there is a hierarchy of AWOL or corrupt LTSOs, STSOs, and suits enabling that employee's behavior.
Meanwhile, Neffenger plans to increase enrollment in Pre by 1) diminishing the availability and extent of the Pre experience for those who pay for it and 2) increasing the length and invasiveness of the checkpoint procedures for pax.
#7
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: DFW
Posts: 28,099
I went through TSA at DFW terminal D last week. The airline had gifted me with Pre Check but that service wasn't offered at that checkpoint so it was Pre Check lite. WTMD and x-ray. Quick and easy the way it should be but often is not. I can see first hand that TSA can run checkpoints well so the focus should be on demanding that level of performance 100% of the time. That goes back to faulty training, supervision, and leadership. I don't give Neffenger a snowballs chance in hades to fix that problem.
#9
Join Date: May 2008
Location: BOS
Programs: TSA TSO
Posts: 455
I wonder how much airport authorities paid to modify their terminals to install all the Extortion-Check areas in the first place? How much more are we paying them in increased parking fees and retail prices to pay for all of it? I guess money was no object in the effort to silence the TSA's most vocal critics.
There's been parking rate increases at BOS, but I know the obvious cause of that, so Massport can pay for the terminal extensions to fit the ever increasing international presence and post-security connectors that have been built or are being built.
Yes, a checkpoint or two has been built or expanded in that time, but that's pretty much it.
#10
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: An NPR mind living in a Fox News world
Posts: 14,165
Not much if at all. The equipment was usually already there in the first place, it just took modifying some settings on said equipment.
There's been parking rate increases at BOS, but I know the obvious cause of that, so Massport can pay for the terminal extensions to fit the ever increasing international presence and post-security connectors that have been built or are being built.
Yes, a checkpoint or two has been built or expanded in that time, but that's pretty much it.
There's been parking rate increases at BOS, but I know the obvious cause of that, so Massport can pay for the terminal extensions to fit the ever increasing international presence and post-security connectors that have been built or are being built.
Yes, a checkpoint or two has been built or expanded in that time, but that's pretty much it.
#11
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: An NPR mind living in a Fox News world
Posts: 14,165
#12
Join Date: May 2008
Location: BOS
Programs: TSA TSO
Posts: 455
You're overlooking the cost of physical barriers, electrical installations, potentially some HVAC and structural modifications such as floor loading, additional lighting, fire suppression systems, etc, let alone the operational cost of all of this. There is also some additional low-voltage wiring costs fof the networks that need to be extended into the new areas for the beeper machines, TSA clerk computers, telephones and other comm, etc.
Can I say the same for other airports, no. But I have a feeling that the majority of airports took a standard lane, reprogrammed the equipment settings and voila, PreCheck lane.
#13
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: DFW
Posts: 28,099
Yes, however, all of that was already in place at BOS. It's not like new checkpoints were being built from scratch for PreCheck. At BOS, it was simple equipment reprogramming and off they went.
Can I say the same for other airports, no. But I have a feeling that the majority of airports took a standard lane, reprogrammed the equipment settings and voila, PreCheck lane.
Can I say the same for other airports, no. But I have a feeling that the majority of airports took a standard lane, reprogrammed the equipment settings and voila, PreCheck lane.
"Reprogrammed the equipment settings", interesting remark. So Pre Chech WTMD's are set differently than regular TSA screening lanes, why would that be?
#14
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 3,526
Currently, only 4 percent of travelers are PreCheck members.
http://thehill.com/policy/transporta...rport-security
That's far, far fewer that I had guessed. He's never going to get the "millions more" that Pistole said last fall were needed in order for PreCheck to work as envisioned.
Last edited by petaluma1; Jul 30, 2015 at 10:45 am
#15
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: NYC
Programs: DL PM, Marriott Gold, Hertz PC, National Exec
Posts: 6,736
From The Hill:
Currently, only 4 percent of travelers are PreCheck members.
"http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/249629-new-tsa-chief-vows-to-tighten-airport-security
That's far, far fewer that I had guessed. He's never going to get the "millions more" that Pistole said last fall were needed in order for PreCheck to work as envisioned.
Currently, only 4 percent of travelers are PreCheck members.
"http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/249629-new-tsa-chief-vows-to-tighten-airport-security
That's far, far fewer that I had guessed. He's never going to get the "millions more" that Pistole said last fall were needed in order for PreCheck to work as envisioned.
I'd also be very surprised if Precheck was only 4% of total trips through security.