The United States government’s Performance.gov website, which tracks US agencies’ progress with meeting mission goals, has published the results of the Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) nationwide passenger experience survey.
The survey was conducted from May 1 through May 15, 2023, under the operational leadership of the Customer Service Branch, at 16 airports across the country. It aimed to collect immediate, comprehensive, reliable and shareable customer experience data without affecting security procedures at the checkpoint. With a total of 13,449 survey responses, passenger engagement exceeded expectations by nearly doubling the initial goal of 7,000 responses.
TSA has established advancing customer experience as one of its priority goals for fiscal year 2024-25 and these efforts are being formalized in a soon-to-be-published strategic roadmap. The agency developed customer experience training – known as CX Demystified – for its entire screening workforce, and this had been provided to almost 16,000 TSA staff nationwide by December 2023. It has also been integrated into the basic training program for new hires at the TSA Academy. The training emphasizes the importance of clear communication regarding security procedures as a key tool for delivering excellent customer experiences.
Initially launched to identify customer pain points during passenger screening, the passenger experience survey results provided valuable insights, indicating that passengers value more than just efficiency and short wait times at the checkpoint. Data analysis of the results revealed that professionalism, respect and understanding of security procedures have a stronger impact on passenger confidence than the reasonableness of wait time.
In terms of the numbers, 93% of respondents said they were satisfied with their experience at the checkpoint, with 94% saying that they have confidence in TSA officers’ ability to keep air travel safe. Ninety-five percent reported that the TSA officers they interacted with were professional and the same number said they were treated with respect. Ninety-one percent said they found their wait time reasonable and 78% said they experienced no challenges at the checkpoint.
One area that saw particular improvement, thanks largely to the CX Demystified training, was ‘understanding why additional screening was required’. This figure jumped from 69% (at the time of the last survey in 2019) to 87%.
TSA found that responding to the survey also proved to be an educational experience for customers, as it helped them identify the processes that TSA can influence at the airport.
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