Airlines say Secure Flight working smoothly, for now

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and the airline industry are trying to address public anxiety over how the new Secure Flight identity-matching program will affect travelers. The program is rolling out smoothly, the airlines say.

"We believe that the Secure Flight implementation is working quite well," said David A. Castelveter, a spokesman for the Air Transport Association. "We have seen no significant interruption to travel."

The next phase of the program comes after airlines get reservations and other customer information in order early next year. That is when passengers' names are expected to be the same on reservations, boarding passes and government-issued identification.

"The airlines have done a fairly good job in the initial setup of Secure Flight," said Joe Brancatelli, publisher of the subscription business-travel website Joesentme.com. But, he added, "travelers really need to get this all organized before the feds start enforcing it."

Under the same full name

Right now, travelers experience Secure Flight through dealings with airlines. Starting in late summer, airlines began asking customers to make reservations under the exact name on the ID to be used at airport security.

Airlines have also been asking that customers ensure all personal information, including frequent-flier accounts, appear under the same full name.

Once airlines are finished with the initial phase, TSA plans to begin more closely matching names on boarding passes with IDs at checkpoints. This is where confusion lies. Will passengers whose IDs have slight variations from their boarding passes be delayed at checkpoints for an extra measure of scrutiny?

On its website, TSA is less than crystal clear on this point. "For the near future, small differences between the passenger's ID and the passenger's reservation information, such as the use of a middle initial instead of a full middle name, or no middle initial at all, should not cause a problem for the passenger," it says.

If that statement were written in the form of a contract, a good lawyer would flag language like "for the near future" and "should not cause." But TSA says not to worry.

"We do understand there are slight variations in the way airlines book their reservations and print their boarding passes," said Paul Leyh, TSA director of Secure Flight. A "slight variation" between a name on an ID and a boarding pass "should not delay the passenger's travel," he said.

Secure Flight was intended to solve a relatively small but widely publicized problem -- extra security screening and resulting delays some people encounter because their names match or approximate identities of people on a secret security watch list maintained by the government. That list contains identities of people deemed to be subject to extra security before flying.

Given more precise information at booking, TSA expects to be able to match more precisely a passenger's identity against those on the watch list. This should reduce the number of people flagged at security until it can be determined they are not the person on a watch list.

"The Secure Flight watch-list matching process occurs before a passenger even gets to the airport," Leyh said. "So if you get a boarding pass, the Secure Flight watch-list matching process is done." In other words, you are clear once you get that pass.

But is that person showing up at the checkpoint with your boarding pass in hand actually you? IDs and boarding pass names are supposed to match. But boarding passes have limited spaces for letters and sometimes truncate or mangle names.

TSA says in those cases, it is up to the screener to scrutinize the ID, including the photo, and decide whether the person holding the boarding pass is the same as the person it was issued to.

Boarding passes sometimes truncate my proper first name, Joseph, as "Jose," and my own mother would not recognize that sorry mug on my passport photo. Still, there "should" be no problem. Let's just say I remain skeptical, but hopeful.

For the near future.