The site allows travellers to access airline flight schedules; directions to airline lounges at airports around the world; flight arrival and departure information; and destination information such as weather forecasts for any city in the world and a currency converter.

The new initiative is in partnership with Star Alliance, the international airline network to which SAA belongs. Star Alliance developed the Common IT Mobile Platform, which SAA used to launch its very own portal for customers. SAA is the first airline in Africa to launch the new service.

“It’s a single source of information for the traveller. Forget about making unnecessary phone calls or logging on to countless websites to get the information you need while you are on the go. Anywhere, anytime, information about your travels it at your finger tips,” says Mike Re, SAA Chief Information Officer.

Airline customers can also access World Tracer information, which tracks requests made about baggage, through the mobile portal. “This tool allows you track where your baggage request is with an airline and how close it is in the process to being resolved,” says Re.

The first phase of the initiative is not controlled by usernames and passwords. Once you enter the address, the information needed is readily available with a few clicks and entries.

Once you enter the site, the application automatically scales to the size of the handset being used. “This convenient tool means no more clicking away to find the rest of the page not in your view because of the limited size of your cellphone screen,” says Re.

The portal is currently available in 5 languages; English, German, Spanish, French, and Portuguese.

SAA plans to increase the functionality of the mobile portal with the launch of phase two later this year, when customers will can request frequent flyer mileage status and check notifications on any irregular flight operations e.g. flight delays and check flight itineraries.

In phase three, also scheduled to be introduced towards the end of the year, customers will be able to check-in for a flight and board a flight by scanning their cellphone at a boarding gate using 2D barcode technology to be implemented at airports.

Visit http://mobile.flysaa.com or http://m.flysaa.com