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.

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.

Neffenger has one focus - to improve results on the Red Team tests.

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?

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 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.

Two comments.

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.

:rolleyes:

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.

Only one thing will fix the TSA. Disbanding it and starting over.
With screeners getting trained by their counterparts in Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong.

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.

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.

Must be New Math...

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.

Yes, every airport had backscatter x-ray machines and remote viewing rooms plus all the required cabling before TSA. Those spaces surely came from somewhere even though they are gone now not to mention the extreme cost to taxpayers that TSA forced on taxpayers while never complying with the law and continues to operate MMW WBI outside the law even today.

"Reprogrammed the equipment settings", interesting remark. So Pre Chech WTMD's are set differently than regular TSA screening lanes, why would that be?

From The Hill:

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.

I wonder if that's 4% of the population (so someone flying 2x a week gets counted as 1, as does someone flying 1x or 0x per year), or 4% of the checkpoint transits (i.e. weighted by frequency of flying).

I'd also be very surprised if Precheck was only 4% of total trips through security.

I would guess that on any given flight most passengers are vacation/leisure flyers and the cost for Pre Check just isn't worth the cost verus the number of flights they take in a years time. Yes, lots of people fly everyday but for the most part they are different people each day and that is where TSA Pre Check misses the mark.

If TSA wants vetted passengers then do it for free, require no in person interview, and use current law enforcement databases to make determinations. Doing so would allow for Pre Check style screening for the majority of travelers and let TSA focus their energy on the remaning unknown or higher risk passengers.

If it's 4% of US check-ins with PreCheck eligible carriers, I would be surprised. If it's 4% of named individuals in some USG database of passengers (and maybe airline crew), that would not surprise me.

When Pistole told the U.S. Senate that 40% are getting expedited screening, he included U12s, senior citizens over 75 years of age and flight crew. I don't recall if the question asked of him was limited to PreCheck or to the broader category of expedited screening.

One very real example: if you were a frequent flyer - or even an infrequent flyer with a family - who flies out of PHX, would you pony up $85/yr/pax for a service that is rarely and inconsistently available?

Weren't something like 85% of passengers flying on a given day supposed to be PreCheck at this point in time?

No wonder Pistole said that "millions more" enrolees were needed to make the program work as it was "intended."

Speaking to Chollie's point:

I'm willing to wager that the TSA expected even those infrequent flyers to enroll with all their kith and kin and that just didn't and won't materialize.

TSA can get there quite easily. All it has to do is give up on the $17/year fee, payable in five-year chunks. The efficiencies that TSA would gain from performing its "background check" on anyone willing to enroll would more than compensate for the loss in fees.

Given that I fly only 1-2 times a year, and sometimes through airports that don't have Pre-Check, it's simply not worth my money to apply.

Any airport large enough to have a dedicated elite line should have a dedicated Pre line, and like the elite line, it should be open and staffed at all times.

I just can't see anyone ponying up his/her $ for a 'maybe' or a 'lite' experience.

Quite the opposite at Dulles....

http://thumbnail.newsinc.com/25524837.sf.jpg

http://https://www.google.com/search...mlF01zYZF4M%3A

And, a post from a knowledgeable FTer...

For me, the $100 Global Entry fee was worth it after being stuck in a security screening line @ JFK for nearly 90 minutes of standing. I have a health condition which normally doesn't interfere with my life...but 90 minutes straight of standing and not moving put me (and my health) in a bad position. If I knew it was going to be THAT bad I would have at least gotten a wheelchair for the wait. I signed up for GE the following day after I recovered.

A snow storm had come and left and air travel was starting to return to normal. TSA had a single Pre-Check/Crew/Elite lane open and a single regular lane open and that was it for the whole terminal. To process probably 400-600 pax all trying to leave and of course they insisted on running everyone through the nude-o-scope (I opted out). They had plenty of people standing around to open more lanes, but they didn't. Fortunately the airline was fully aware and was holding planes, but this was causing delays throughout their network that day.

Shouldn't the discussion center around effective deployment of TSA resources instead of getting 4% of flyers through expedited screening?

Absolutely it should. The easiest solution would be to make pre-check-level security the standard.

Mike

Speaking of which - it seemed that after a period of frequent PreCheck "random alarms" requiring additional screening, the "random alarms" fell down to a seemingly more "random" low number.

Now, my observations show that alarms are once again increasing in frequency, only they don't call them "random" anymore. I learned yesterday in ATL that TSA now refers to them as "quotas."

The "quota" designation means that they now have a set level of PreCheck pax per day that must undergo additional screening, i.e. hand swab, scanner, or patdown.

I wonder if the advertising for Pre spells all this out: it may not be available at some airports, even large ones like PHX, it may only be offered in modified form (Pre LITE), you are still subject to quota random additional searches, including but not limited to gropes for those who are physically incapable of assuming and holding the position for the NoS.

A family of four that flies once a year could easily spend $300+ and, particularly if they fly out of PHX, never once get a full Pre experience.

As jkhuggins mentioned up thread we all don't fly often enough to make Pre Check much of a bargain. I departed DFW last week and the airline gifted us with Pre. Making two legs tomorrow and again gifted with Pre on both legs. No status and these flights are miles redemptions.

I think Pre style screening should be given to every traveler that has a track record with an airline. Focus on the unknowns.

Those infrequent flyers, who are the majority of flyers, are exactly the reason that PreCheck has not been the be-all and end-all that the TSA thought it would be.

Witnessed at MIA this morning, regular screening lanes clobbered with people and the Pre lane had no one in it until I showed up. After clearing TSA watched at least two groups of TSA screeners walking terminal D asking for documents. These people must be excess if they are not needed to clear screening backlogs and another indication that TSA is overstaffed.

Had a TSA Officer as a patient today in the ER and while stitching up his hand we made small chit chat about this and that and Airport Security did come up at one point and this individual said he personally felt that Pre Level of Screening is probably good enough for the majority of travelers.

I didn't really press him as it seemed inappropriate to do so while I was stitching him up and more over he really does not make policy decision, so no amount of complaining on my part would have done a bit of good. Though, it was interesting to hear a TSA Employee say basically the same thing we have said here.

The Gentleman seemed nice enough and we both chuckled about the "yellers" who feel the need to yell at the checkpoint, he felt all the yelling did was serve to annoy the Passengers and his/her fellow Employees. I asked why some yell and said probably out of frustration due to having to say the same thing over and over and seemingly not many people listening, though he did say that WAS NOT AN EXCUSE.

Hope you gave him big stitches.

What documents were they looking for? Did people seem to submit readily?

I didn't hang around but looked like ID & boarding pass along with interrogation.

Lol, the patient seemed like alright people, just doing a job. A job I may not agree with, but he deserves the same level of treatment as any other person that presents in the ER.

Funny you brought up MASH one of the reasons I became an MD was watching MASH and wanting to be like MDs. on the show.