Checking In for Your Flight--From Home

Alaska Airlines this month began letting its online customers print out their own boarding passes from their personal computers, allowing them to go directly to the airport gate. The move, thought to be an industry first, comes as airlines expand their online presence and invade the shrinking territory of travel agents.

Alaska spokesman Jack Evans said about a third of his airline’s customers now buy their tickets directly from the airline rather than through travel agents and about 10% of the direct bookings are online, a figure that has roughly tripled in the last year. Alaska, the 10th largest domestic airline, was also the first to offer ticketing on the Internet in 1995. The site is https://www.alaskaair.com.

Although Alaska customers book their seats when they buy their tickets online, they must wait until the day of travel to print out the boarding pass and must have carry-on baggage only; those with checked baggage are barred from printing out their own passes.