Electronic grouping of Umrah pilgrims to prevent chaos

The Ministry of Haj and Umrah Affairs has for the first time launched an electronic system for grouping Umrah pilgrims leaving the Kingdom to avoid confusion and delays in their departure schedules. 
Bandar bin Muhammad Al-Hajjar, minister of Haj Affairs, has directed all Umrah service providers to strictly adhere to the mechanism for total grouping of worshippers during this season. The system will ensure that reservations are scheduled on the agenda of the Civil Aviation Department to avoid delays in pilgrims’ departure after performing the holy rituals. 
Teams handling the system will constantly monitor the electronic bar code of group lists to detect violations. Whoever commits an error in the groupings operation, be it Umrah companies or airlines, will bear full responsibility of lodging and accommodating, as well as finding alternative reservations for Umrah pilgrims to ensure that they leave the country in an organized manner.
The ministry has issued clear and strict instructions to all Umrah companies that they should comply with the regulations and directions. It also urged them to implement the systems and laws in place to ensure total electronic grouping of all Umrah pilgrims.  It stressed on the need to ensure that all buses reach the designated airline gates six hours prior to scheduled departure time of the flight.
Hajjar personally went through all the procedures of the Ministry and its staff to ensure that all departures are on time and without any problem. These arrangements, he said, are in the best interest of Umrah pilgrims so that they can leave the country smoothly and get back to their homelands safely without facing any inconvenience.
Undersecretary of Haj Ministry, Issa Rawas, explained that the directions issued by the ministry emphasized on the importance of organized work during this Umrah season, saying this can be accomplished by correct implementation of the electronic grouping system.  
Giving details of the mechanism, Rawas said the first step is to make sure that the flights are included in the lists of Civil Aviation, which is essential for final grouping of pilgrims, and not to rely on boarding cards. 
“The mechanism involves submitting an application for the departure grouping through the automated system of the Umrah of each bus that the company wants to move to the airport. The application should be submitted 24 hours before the scheduled departure time,” he said, adding that any application submitted before the defined time frame will be disregarded.   
The undersecretary said the system will check out the scheduled time of the flight on the list of Civil Aviation. “Once the application is approved, the company will get a response from the electronic system according to the bar code which represents the reference number of the application.
“Follow up and supervision committees in Makkah will coordinate with Umrah companies so that the supervisor can read all the bar codes of departures after receiving the lists of flights of each company concerning passengers and their baggage, and all the other details,” he said. 
The General Authority of Civil Aviation said that it was operating and handling all flights without delay across terminals of King Abdul Aziz International Airport. It said that all Umrah Pilgrims were being moved to the Northern and Southern lounges, while other passengers were being shifted to departure lounges to accommodate the increasing number of visitors leaving the country, particularly during the last 10 days of Ramadan and Eid vacation, when traffic is at its peak at the airport.