Suvarnabhumi Adds More Staff To Prevent Malfunction

[webfact]

 

AIRPORTS of Thailand (AOT) has rushed to add more staff to prevent malfunction at Suvarnabhumi Airport as ordered Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin with 200 additional officials joining the team manning the immigration counters from tomorrow, Matichon newspaper said late afternoon yesterday (Feb. 18).

 

Mr. Keerati Kijmanawat, AOT’s president, told Srettha that more officials were enrolled because there was a 30 percent shortage in this key role.

 

The expanded team will speed up immigration process from 5,500 people/hour to 7,000 people/hour.

 

Moreover AOT is also hiring an additional 200 workers to manage queues and recommend the use of automated systems and they should be starting work either at the end of March or early April.

 

by TNR Staff

Photo: Matichon

 

Full story: THAI NEWSROOM 2024-02-19

 

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[flyingtlger]

15 minutes ago, webfact said:

AIRPORTS of Thailand (AOT) has rushed to add more staff to prevent malfunction at Suvarnabhumi Airport

Like that's really going to help?  If anything, the clowns at the airport are like civil servants that don't give a squat as to to how much they accomplish. They are like the DMV employees in the US. They are there on a time salary, it doesn't matter how much they accomplish. It's how much time is left on the clock. Case in point, I have witnesses many a times when the customs officials in Suvarnambhumi stopping and taking their sweet time, conversing and laughing with co workers and ignoring the passengers in line to have their passports checked.

They need to fix the machines and computers not add more employees.....

[Mbolo]

200 more unsmiling, unfriendly welcoming’ staff. 

[hotchilli]

3 hours ago, webfact said:

AIRPORTS of Thailand (AOT) has rushed to add more staff to prevent malfunction at Suvarnabhumi Airport as ordered Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin with 200 additional officials joining the team manning the immigration counters from tomorrow

What a novel idea.. it might catch-on world-wide.

[geisha]

Unfortunately it’s a customer service problem that is rife all over Thailand in every domaine. These people have no proper schooling/ education. From the top level down.  They don’t  realize what tourists think when they stand in one or 2 hour long queues after traveling 12/ 20 hours to get there, they don’t care if someone buys that phone or jacket or shoes, or that face in their phone attitude is really annoying. The airport has been a source of tourist agony and anger for years and none gives a damn. Just see the screw ups all over the country which make the country laughable abroad. For heavens sake, get the kids and young educated , Thailands staff problem is very embarrassing ! 

[spidermike007]

Adding more staff to prevent breakdowns in the system is just basic common sense. Last time I arrived the que was enormous. Who wants to get off a long flight, walk 20 minutes to immigration, and then wait on a 45 minute line? People remember stuff like that. 

 

What is needed at immigration is more intelligence. 

[Gandtee]

13 minutes ago, spidermike007 said:

Adding more staff to prevent breakdowns in the system is just basic common sense. Last time I arrived the que was enormous. Who wants to get off a long flight, walk 20 minutes to immigration, and then wait on a 45 minute line? People remember stuff like that. 

 

What is needed at immigration is more intelligence. 

More intelligence? You ask too much. staff are discouraged to make suggestions to those in charge to avoid loss of face for their supervisors. So they don't. This attitude is drummed into the young generation from their first day at school.

[Purdey]

Interesting to see a prime minister telling a listed company how to do its job 

[khunjeff]

4 hours ago, webfact said:

AIRPORTS of Thailand (AOT) has rushed to add more staff to prevent malfunction at Suvarnabhumi Airport as ordered Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin with 200 additional officials joining the team manning the immigration counters from tomorrow

 

As usual, this is either poor reporting or just nonsense. How can AOT - an airport management company - bring on immigration officers, who belong to the police? Are we talking about actual officers at the counters, or just more officious teenage queue managers in red vests?

 

5 hours ago, webfact said:

Mr. Keerati Kijmanawat, AOT’s president, told Srettha that more officials were enrolled because there was a 30 percent shortage in this key role.

 

Immigration has told us repeatedly, every time there's a negative news story about long queues, that all 119 counters are staffed, and that the problem is those pesky flights that just keep landing. So where is the "30% shortage"? Or is AOT finally admitting that the previous claims were nonsense? Or are they only talking about "queue managers"?

 

5 hours ago, webfact said:

Moreover AOT is also hiring an additional 200 workers to manage queues

 

So are these the same 200 new staff mentioned above (in which case they won't be manning the counters, just waving their arms and shouting), or 200 support staff in addition to 200 more officers? Pro tip: if there aren't enough actual officers to process everyone in a timely fashion, no extra number of facilitators will speed up the process.

 

[Mickboy]

Suwannapoom correct prounciation

[JoePai]

It's not just the immigration side, the whole of ground handling at the airport is abysmal 

[spidermike007]

1 hour ago, Gandtee said:

More intelligence? You ask too much. staff are discouraged to make suggestions to those in charge to avoid loss of face for their supervisors. So they don't. This attitude is drummed into the young generation from their first day at school.

Thailand is going go have to figure out a way to get beyond this purile and ridiculous practice of "face", if it wants to progress as a nation and move forward. It holds them back on countless levels. 

[Toby1947]

Getting out is just as big a problem. What's simpler than looking at a passport. No overstay have a nice journey on your way. Oh no too simple for these morons it's chaos 

Edited February 19 by Toby1947

[RandolphGB]

2 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

What is needed at immigration is more intelligence. 

 

A rare commodity here.

[john donson]

another joke

 

samut prakarn immigration has 15 counters, hardly ever 2-3 are serving people, the rest enjoying their snacks, coffee, playing phones...

 

someone has to open and count those nice brown envelopes they get from agents bringing in stacks of 10-20 passports and in and out in 30 minutes...

 

the rest can wait half a day

[Davedub]

Absolutely. This country is crippled by the practice of saving face. Factor in the unfathomable amount of pointless bureacracy and the ways in which promotions get awarded and the solutions to the vast majority of Thailand's problems become very apparent. 

[fondue zoo]

27 minutes ago, john donson said:

another joke

 

samut prakarn immigration has 15 counters, hardly ever 2-3 are serving people, the rest enjoying their snacks, coffee, playing phones...

 

someone has to open and count those nice brown envelopes they get from agents bringing in stacks of 10-20 passports and in and out in 30 minutes...

 

the rest can wait half a day

 

The trick from watching those agents is to also deliver a dozen boxes of quality oranges on a hand trolley. The nice ones in the fancy packaging.

That appears to be the currency of the realm at CW, every time I've been someone is wheeling in oranges, into an immigration back office. 

Certainly there is other fruit but oranges is where it's at.

 

[Korat Kiwi]

When are we going to see more of these 'smart' terminals, where all you need to do is scan your passport and away you go thru immigration? 

 

I have seen some in the VIP/invited guests area so what about us peasants huh? 

 

With all this technology surely these machines can raise alarms for overstayers and the like. 

 

Last time I came in there were no officers at all in the 'goods to declare/duty' halls. I was rather surprised by that. 

 

Things immigration have moved forward.. Just.  But nothing to really speed up the process. 

 

Bit like the local immigration office. Great staff and very helpful but talk about paperwork for the sake of paperwork. 

 

Where the heck do they store all this stuff? Scan it and then burn it?  Otherwise they would need a huge warehouse. 

 

The mind boggles.... 21st century huh? 

[webfact]

Bangkok airport battles congestion with tech amid tourism recovery
by Alex Morgan

 

Photo courtesy of Apichit Jinakul

 

Suvarnabhumi International Airport in Bangkok, Thailand’s busiest, is facing daily traffic congestion as vehicles compete for parking spaces. The problem is compounded by long queues at immigration and baggage claim areas due to inoperative kiosks and staff shortages.

 

Tourist complaints prompted an unannounced visit from Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, who has since ordered airport authorities to quicken procedures to under 30 minutes per passenger. As the country welcomed 3.03 million foreign visitors last month, a rise from the previous year’s 2.1 million, the pressure on airports has increased significantly.

 

The recovery of tourism post-pandemic has led to airlines increasing flight frequencies, seeking to reach full capacity as quickly as possible to offset losses incurred during the pandemic. However, staffing shortages in airports and airlines worldwide are impeding growth. The adoption of technology that could help alleviate the labour shortage in aviation has been slow due to system instability and the comparatively low level of technology proficiency in Thailand.

By 2025, it is expected that 63% of airports and 51% of airlines globally will have self-boarding gates using biometrics, with 53% of airports implementing a secure single biometric token for all touchpoints, reported Bangkok Post.

In addition to adopting new technology, Airports of Thailand (AoT) announced last year a passenger service charge increase at six international airports from April 1, 2024. The additional tax of 30 baht is rolled into ticket prices, making the new total service charge 730 baht, and is allocated via the new operating system, Common Use Passenger Processing Systems (Cupps). This system is designed to reduce long queues at check-in counters and is already familiar to passengers using Suvarnabhumi and Don Mueang airports.

 

Santisuk Klongchaiya, CEO of Thai AirAsia, reported that 20-30% of their passengers are using self-service check-in at Don Mueang airport, with many using their mobile phones or websites to check in online before arriving at the airport. He also affirmed that automated ground handling services will become increasingly important at airports, especially those dealing with labour shortages.

 

Airport technology

 

However, the adoption of technology is not an absolute solution. As Santisuk and Sumesh Patel, president of Asia-Pacific at SITA, pointed out, aviation is a service industry that requires human intervention for troubleshooting. They believe that rather than causing layoffs, new technologies will improve passenger services and increase operational efficiency, with staff roles evolving and becoming more service-oriented.

Despite these advancements, there are still hurdles to overcome. Wutthiphum Jurangkool, CEO of Nok Air, said that tech adoption in Thailand is slower than in Europe and the US, as passengers need time to become accustomed to new airport technologies. Additionally, the physical structure of older airports may not fully accommodate some of these new technologies.

 

Sumesh emphasised that all airports and airlines, regardless of size, must adopt new technologies due to the rapid changes in the aviation industry driven by the pandemic. Furthermore, cloud technology makes digital transition and advanced IT affordable and accessible for regional or budget-conscious airports, allowing them to implement smart digital operations cost-effectively.

 

Full story: The Thaiger 2024-02-19

 

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[scorecard]

6 hours ago, flyingtlger said:

Like that's really going to help?  If anything, the clowns at the airport are like civil servants that don't give a squat as to to how much they accomplish. They are like the DMV employees in the US. They are there on a time salary, it doesn't matter how much they accomplish. It's how much time is left on the clock. Case in point, I have witnesses many a times when the customs officials in Suvarnambhumi stopping and taking their sweet time, conversing and laughing with co workers and ignoring the passengers in line to have their passports checked.

They need to fix the machines and computers not add more employees.....

And change the attitude of the staff, which can be done, and change the reward (pay) system to a performance base rather than just a time base.

 

Plus put into every contract of employment clauses which clearly indicate:

 

- Lack of performance / low performance quickly turns to dismissal, meaning that 'guaranteed job for life' doesn't exist.

-The company / organization has continuous transparent systems / methods to observe and measure performance.

 

The Singapore public service including all gov't ministries and agencies (one example the education ministry) etc., changed to this quite a few years back.

 

Singapore also did some serious work to create credible methods of assessing / observing performance and they are actively in place. 

 

Australia has done something similar by creating 'government corporations', including old government job for life offices / agencies into performance based operations.

 

I'm aware of one quasi Thai gov't corporation which has done the same thing. The first to get dismissed because of lack of performance was 90% of the HR team. 

 

It can be done.

[scorecard]

17 minutes ago, fondue zoo said:

 

The trick from watching those agents is to also deliver a dozen boxes of quality oranges on a hand trolley. The nice ones in the fancy packaging.

That appears to be the currency of the realm at CW, every time I've been someone is wheeling in oranges, into an immigration back office. 

Certainly there is other fruit but oranges is where it's at.

 

 

Oranges have a special meaning.

 

Go to a business meeting in China, probably with old style Chinese business folks and especially if the meeting / dinner has been set up for the host company to get acquainted with another company which is trying to win a work contract. 

 

If plates of cut oranges appear on the table near the end of the meeting / dinner it's an indication the host likes you / thinks your capable of doing the work the host is requiring.

 

[Srikcir]

8 hours ago, flyingtlger said:

it doesn't matter how much they accomplish.

The 5,000 new hires will want to do well to be retained permanently as civil service jobs pay well and have good benefits. So yes, it matters how well they do the job for which they were hired.

[ikke1959]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Additionally, the physical structure of older airports may not fully accommodate some of these new technologies.

If in the EU and US the old airports can implement new technology why isn't that possible a recently built airport in Thailand?? Suvarnabhumi is not so old as Charles de Gaulle in Paris or Schiphol in Amsterdam or Heathrow in London... If they can do why a problem in Thailand?

[scorecard]

15 minutes ago, ikke1959 said:

If in the EU and US the old airports can implement new technology why isn't that possible a recently built airport in Thailand?? Suvarnabhumi is not so old as Charles de Gaulle in Paris or Schiphol in Amsterdam or Heathrow in London... If they can do why a problem in Thailand?

 

In Thailand there's an item which strongly supersedes the comment just above.

 

It comes down to a few words 'corruption / collusion'. 

 

Many politicians / parties see this as operationalizing the very reason why they entered politics, a chance at the trough, often for very big money.

 

And it often means creating new budgets, often enough for unneeded building etc., opportunities to sell land at massively inflated prices for facilities which aren't really needed or for which current facilities can easily be upgraded.

 

That's all ignored to create a big budget / in other words create new chance at the trough. 

Edited February 19 by scorecard

[scorecard]

35 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

The 5,000 new hires will want to do well to be retained permanently as civil service jobs pay well and have good benefits. So yes, it matters how well they do the job for which they were hired.

 

That should be true of course, but in reality not so true.

[Gandtee]

2 hours ago, scorecard said:

 

Oranges have a special meaning.

 

Go to a business meeting in China, probably with old style Chinese business folks and especially if the meeting / dinner has been set up for the host company to get acquainted with another company which is trying to win a work contract. 

 

If plates of cut oranges appear on the table near the end of the meeting / dinner it's an indication the host likes you / thinks your capable of doing the work the host is requiring.

 

But what are the oranges covering. Some sort of sweetener?😉

[Sig]

7 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

Adding more staff to prevent breakdowns in the system is just basic common sense. Last time I arrived the que was enormous. Who wants to get off a long flight, walk 20 minutes to immigration, and then wait on a 45 minute line? People remember stuff like that. 

 

What is needed at immigration is more intelligence. 

Immigration could make a few bucks off the situation by opening a coffee kiosk where people could fuel up while they wait. And if they wanted to engender any good will toward themselves, they could even offer it for a low price in any currency and still make a few Baht out of the deal.
To me, that would be intelligent. They aren't going to fix the wait, so might as well work on the comfort and attitude level of their visitors. Heck, they could even have a couple of people there offering 5 or 10 minute foot massages for 50 Baht. Get a little refreshed after a long flight and trudging to Immigration and stand in line feeling a little better. At the least it would look nicer. I'm not usually in any rush. I'd probably grab a cup of tea or a cold fresh fruit juice and have a seat for a few minutes. Give you a little time to prepare yourself for the line as you watch it move for a little bit, rather than entering it with frustration right away.

[spidermike007]

37 minutes ago, Sig said:

Immigration could make a few bucks off the situation by opening a coffee kiosk where people could fuel up while they wait. And if they wanted to engender any good will toward themselves, they could even offer it for a low price in any currency and still make a few Baht out of the deal.
To me, that would be intelligent. They aren't going to fix the wait, so might as well work on the comfort and attitude level of their visitors. Heck, they could even have a couple of people there offering 5 or 10 minute foot massages for 50 Baht. Get a little refreshed after a long flight and trudging to Immigration and stand in line feeling a little better. At the least it would look nicer. I'm not usually in any rush. I'd probably grab a cup of tea or a cold fresh fruit juice and have a seat for a few minutes. Give you a little time to prepare yourself for the line as you watch it move for a little bit, rather than entering it with frustration right away.

I think what you are suggesting is a way to honor the tourists who decide to come to Thailand and spend a lot of money. It's a great idea, but it requires some imagination and initiative. 

[it is what it is]

8 hours ago, geisha said:

Unfortunately it’s a customer service problem that is rife all over Thailand in every domaine. These people have no proper schooling/ education. From the top level down.  They don’t  realize what tourists think when they stand in one or 2 hour long queues after traveling 12/ 20 hours to get there, they don’t care if someone buys that phone or jacket or shoes, or that face in their phone attitude is really annoying. The airport has been a source of tourist agony and anger for years and none gives a damn. Just see the screw ups all over the country which make the country laughable abroad. For heavens sake, get the kids and young educated , Thailands staff problem is very embarrassing ! 

 

been coming here over 25 years, tbh can't say i've ever experienced bad customer service from an IO at the airport or immigration centre, they are certainly friendlier than some of the central american land borders i've crossed.

 

if you're continually getting poor customer service you need to manage your expectations, these are civil servants doing a responsible but ultimately repetitive, boring job. i'm a believer in what goes around comes around, maybe you need to look at your attitude?

[Gandtee]

6 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

Thailand is going go have to figure out a way to get beyond this purile and ridiculous practice of "face", if it wants to progress as a nation and move forward. It holds them back on countless levels. 

Back fifteen years, my foster son came back from school and said his English teacher said you pronounced giraffe, giraffee because it has an e on the end. When he politely said it's giraffe she told him not to argue with her. He came second in a National English speaking contest and even now is called upon by his Thai international company to do their presentations for them. Perhaps his teacher should have listened to him. Until the Thai education system is elevated from marching, haircuts and dictatorial teaching, and encourages imaginative and lateral thinking, not much will change. But then it's not my country.