4 ms·

I am sorry but the idea was a stupid one to begin with. After 4 years in operation in what seems to be one the markets where customers had real pain and willin

by kvs 17y ago

I am sorry but the idea was a stupid one to begin with. After 4 years in operation in what seems to be one the markets where customers had real pain and willing to pay for painless travel (and a monopoly?) they still needed credit to operate?

Kadin 17y ago
I think the idea was sound, they just executed it poorly. They charged an awful lot of money for a very small savings of time and irritation. I think this wasn't entirely their fault -- the TSA put a lot of requirements on the Verified Identity program -- but they tried to run with it as a business and failed. They wanted something like $129 a year, and for this you got a pass (getting it involved 2 trips to the airport or a Clear office and giving them a ton of personal information plus biometric data) that let you skip the ID check line. It didn't let you skip security entirely, it just let you get to the front of the ticket+ID check line. I had a card for a while because I was flying out of Reagan airport in DC at peak times a few times a week for a year. Even under these conditions -- which would be best-case as far as a program like Clear was concerned -- I think Clear probably only shaved a minute or two of waiting off each time. Their whole verification system depended on you, with assistance from a Clear agent, putting a smartcard into a kiosk, verifying your photo, and then verifying your fingerprint on a reader that typically didn't work very well. I think there was the option for retinal identification but I never used it (the scanner wasn't working the day I signed up for my card so it wasn't recorded). Up until fairly recently, the TSA wouldn't let them use the Clear card, with all its biometric, smartcard glory, as a form of identification. So in addition to the whole Clear card process, you'd still need to get out your drivers license and show it to the ID-check person. The whole thing had potential (which is sad to begin with, that airport security is such a clusterfuck that there's a market for anything that expedites it), but they never seemed to have it down right. Personally I'm just glad to not have to fly regularly anymore.
- kvs 17y ago
  Saving time, surely a good result. Pre-clearing passengers, not so much of a good idea to achieve that result.

by kvs 17y ago

Kadin 17y ago

I think the idea was sound, they just executed it poorly. They charged an awful lot of money for a very small savings of time and irritation. I think this wasn't entirely their fault -- the TSA put a lot of requirements on the Verified Identity program -- but they tried to run with it as a business and failed. They wanted something like $129 a year, and for this you got a pass (getting it involved 2 trips to the airport or a Clear office and giving them a ton of personal information plus biometric data) that let you skip the ID check line. It didn't let you skip security entirely, it just let you get to the front of the ticket+ID check line. I had a card for a while because I was flying out of Reagan airport in DC at peak times a few times a week for a year. Even under these conditions -- which would be best-case as far as a program like Clear was concerned -- I think Clear probably only shaved a minute or two of waiting off each time. Their whole verification system depended on you, with assistance from a Clear agent, putting a smartcard into a kiosk, verifying your photo, and then verifying your fingerprint on a reader that typically didn't work very well. I think there was the option for retinal identification but I never used it (the scanner wasn't working the day I signed up for my card so it wasn't recorded). Up until fairly recently, the TSA wouldn't let them use the Clear card, with all its biometric, smartcard glory, as a form of identification. So in addition to the whole Clear card process, you'd still need to get out your drivers license and show it to the ID-check person. The whole thing had potential (which is sad to begin with, that airport security is such a clusterfuck that there's a market for anything that expedites it), but they never seemed to have it down right. Personally I'm just glad to not have to fly regularly anymore.

kvs 17y ago
Saving time, surely a good result. Pre-clearing passengers, not so much of a good idea to achieve that result.