The International Association of Airport Duty Free Stores (IAADFS) has been discussing ways in which it can assist and work with airports in The Americas that are adversely affected by long security queues, which, in

turn, reduce terminal dwell time for passengers.
IAADFS Executive Director Michael Payne said that it is a significant challenge and he has set up a meeting with ACI North America to discuss it and IAADFS also intends to do the same with ACI South America.
‘We are going to talk about ways that we can work with airport authorities one-on-one with each other and we are going to see which of these problems are caused by the way that the airport has got its structure, versus what the security issues are that are creating the lack of dwell time ? because it is actually often a little bit of both.
‘Some of it is actually Homeland Security and there are other security interests in different countries. Some of it is also just a function of the way it is all laid out and staffing issues. So we are trying to have some dialogue to see what we can contribute to that. Part of it is getting it discussed at the very early design of the facility and when the store first gets built and the airport first starts to expand.’
Payne said that with new airport terminals and facilities now being created in locations such as New York JFK and Miami airports, it was important to discuss these matters at the design and passenger flow planning stages. But he emphasised that this was not a US only problem.
‘JFK is a great example, there is expansion coming in Miami and there are other stores at gateway airports where you will be able to influence how it is laid out and the same is true in Latin America. So we don?t look at it as a US issue. IAADFS is Canada through to the end of South America and the Caribbean, so we look at it on a much broader scale.’