American Airlines is trying the embarrassment route to remind people they need to wait their turn when boarding flights.
The repeated announcements and reminders to line up for flights only when you’re told to do so don’t work for everyone, so American Airlines came up with a new way to have what many airline employees not-so-nicely refer to as “gate lice,” or the people who gather early, hovering around the boarding area, trying to board a flight before their assigned time.
Now when someone with a Group 9 boarding position tries to get on with the Group 1 passengers, they hear what the company called an “audible signal” and an alert for the gate agent that someone has jumped the line, The Washington Post reported. The agent then tells the line-skipping passenger they’re not in the correct group.
“We are in the early phase of testing new technology used during the boarding process. The new technology is designed to ensure customers receive the benefits of priority boarding with ease and helps improve the boarding experience by providing greater visibility into boarding progress for our team,” the company said in a statement.