Does anyone know if the seat allocation (or boarding group in the case of easyjet) shows up when they scan the barcode at the airport gate?

Having seen people manage to get through the boarding gate and get onto the wrong plane, I think there is bugger all on them. Either that, or the gate staff are incompetent; one of the two.

Barcodes are typically just a 12 or 13 digit number.

It's down to the scanning system as to what information they can ascertain from that number. more than likely, it's a unique ID for a line in a database somewhere which may contain all sorts of information relating to the passenger/booking. As for what information the air-side stewards at the gate have, I have no idea.

flamejob – if you're thinking of photoshopping speedy boarding onto your pass, I'll be interested to hear how you get on with it 🙂

geoff – I have no idea what you are talking about; this may or may not have worked in my home city airport on Monday when I flew to London.

I fly home today and know they scan the barcode at gatwick so am just wondering, purely for curiosity's sake, what the gate crew see when they scan the code.