CAAS urges airport retailers to act to end confiscations

The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) has contacted the Asia Pacific Travel Retail Association (APTRA) to urge retailers to ensure that liquids, aerosols and gels (LAGs) sold to passengers transferring at Singapore Changi airport are placed in sealed tamper-evident bags (STEBs). The call comes just three days after CAAS introduced its LAGs policy at Changi, allowing passengers to transfer with their purchases provided they are in STEBs with the receipt visible.

In a letter to APTRA, the authority wrote: "Based on our implementation of LAGs measures over the past three days, we continue to have cases of passengers transferring at Changi from [other] airports with duty-free liquor [products]that are not packed in a tamper-evident bag...We seek your assistance in leveraging on the APTRA platform to inform duty-free shops that LAGs items bought by passengers who have a connecting flight in Singapore must be in a tamper-evident bag. If these items are not in a tamper-evident bag, passengers will be inconvenienced as they would have to dispose off these items before they proceed to board their connecting flight in Singapore."

Editor’s note: CAAS has a good point, but it must also take its own advice. Singapore Changi’s security system, with checks at gates rather than centralised, means that even LAGs purchased by passengers originating at Changi must be placed in STEBs. And while RavenFox.com can confirm this is happening with duty-free purchases, it has not spread to other retailers. Bottles of water and soft drinks sold at the airport’s news retailers and catering outlets are not being placed in STEBs and passengers are not being warned at the point of sale that they will not be able to carry the goods with them on their flight. While this might not seem as important as the duty-free issue, it is still an inconvenience to passengers that could affect their goodwill towards airport shopping in general.