United Joins the Mobile Boarding Pass Parade

Apparently I'm way behind the times, because I got excited when an email arrived from United Airlines letting me know that they were starting a mobile boarding pass program. "You mean I don't have to print up a boarding pass and bring it with me, making sure I don't lose it along the way?" I thought, quickly followed by "Hot diggity!" Well, courtesy of a Google search for "mobile boarding pass," I realized this is something that's been going on since, oh, late 2008. This is what happens when you primarily fly Virgin America, apparently.

With United entering the fray, they join American, Continental, Delta, and Alaska and Horizon as the other US-based airlines allowing customers to use their mobile device to not only check-in, but have the boarding pass bar code on the device scanned at both security checkpoints and at the gate. And, as United points out, "Should a seat change, upgrade or change in departure gate occur, your boarding pass can be refreshed to display the new information."

Now that's pretty sweet. So far, eight airports are taking part in the United program, with another five soon to join (you can find the list here). Increased efficiency and saving trees. Sounds great to me. Now if Virgin could join the mobile boarding pass club (and, since I'm asking, add more routes), I would be one very happy camper.

Photo by adactio via Flickr.