No more boarding calls at regional airports

Passengers departing on flights from the Airports Company South Africa’s six regional airports will no longer receive passenger boarding calls from July 1. 

Port Elizabeth International Airport, Bram Fischer International Airport, East London Airport, George Airport, Upington International Airport and Kimberley Airport will all be implementing the intervention to reduce noise levels at the airports.

The Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) made the announcement on Monday. 

Standard operating procedures for most domestic flights require that passengers start boarding at least 30 minutes before the scheduled departure time.

From July public address microphones at domestic departure terminals and gates at regional airports will be switched off.

ACSA said passengers were advised to check their boarding passes and the flight information display boards for boarding times.

The company added that the only instances where centralised terminal announcements would be made would be for irregular operations such as gate changes, flight time changes, security matters, system failures and customer service anomalies such as lost minors.

ACSA Corporate Affairs Manager Senior Manager for Regional Airports, Senzeni Ndebele, said: “We believe that this is an important step in our continued effort to improve the customer service experience of passengers at our regional airports by reducing noise levels at our airports.

"This is in line with international best practice where airports have adopted a ‘silent airport’ policy to improve airport ambience”.

This follows the implementation of noise reduction measures taken at other South African airports over the last year.

Independent customer surveys, commissioned by ACSA, noted complaints about noise levels in airports Ndebele said.