An Introduction to the Onboarding and Activations Team

Welcome back to Jump Seat. This time, we’d like to introduce you to an important support team you’ve (probably) never heard of: The Onboarding and Activations Team. The name “Activations” doesn’t do justice to all that this team handles. It’s more like the “activation / deactivation / tail-change / suspension / unsuspension / company-name-change / services-configuration / continuous-improvement team.” 

What We Do  

The short answer is “set up everything associated with your use of ARINCDirect services,” which expands to at least the following: 

• New customer creation and configuration 
• Management steps for aircraft worldwide (activation, deactivation, suspension, unsuspension)
• Handling registration (tail) number changes 
• Setting up sharing of aircraft among several accounts 
• Handling the (MANY!) steps needed for a company name change 
• Interacting with sales, billing, contracts, operations, training, and tech teams 

And for each of these configuration items, different endpoints must be set up and checked. This leads to some other important tasks that your Activations Team undertakes to help keep these processes fast, smooth, and error-free: 

• Write and debug procedure guides for new and modified services
• Test new and updated processes
• Strive for continuous improvement in speed and error rates
• Spend a lot of time with customers via email and phone calls

Your Activations Team 

Melodye Arant - In her 13-plus years of aviation experience, Melodye has worked MANY jobs in customer support and has been with ARINCDirect for over 9 years. Her current role is as an Implementation Coordinator, and as a long-term member of Activations, she is still in awe of the growth we've had. 

Luke Arant - Luke has 16 years of aviation experience, and 7 of those are with ARINCDirect. He's currently an Implementation Coordinator and is an FAA-certified dispatcher. He's served as a flight coordinator and operations team leader, so he’s well acquainted with our approaches to customer support. Luke and Melodye have a two-year-old son. 

Steve Ball - Steve has extensive experience as a dispatcher (FAA certified) in both military and civilian positions. He's been with ARINCDirect for more than 15 years, as a flight coordinator, flight follower, and now as an Implementation Coordinator. 

Meghan Boyk – Meghan started with ARINCDirect 8 years ago, working on the sales team. She has been the leader of the Activations team for the past four years and enjoys her roles helping our business aviation customers and streamlining processes. Like her entire team, the customer is at the heart of what she does. 

Lauren Cadogan - As the newest member of the Activations team, Lauren has been busy acquiring the wide range of knowledge and expertise needed as an Implementation Coordinator. She is no stranger to good customer service, though, having worked in support in the medical field. 

Ashley Howell - Right after obtaining her dispatcher license, Ashley joined ARINCDirect as a flight coordinator in 2016. She started as an Implementation Coordinator two years ago. Aviation is a passion, driving her to concentrate on astrophysics and pursue a degree in air-traffic control. 

Jake Klus - An 8-year veteran of ARINCDirect, Jake served as a flight coordinator until he became an Implementation Coordinator about a year ago. Prior to ARINCDirect he was in the US Navy for four years, followed by college studies. 

Joan Kwek - Joan, a Singapore-based team member, has been on the Activations Team for over two years. Prior to this, she served as a Flight Dispatcher for Singapore Airlines. With a degree in aircraft engineering, she has deep knowledge of aviation and aerospace, and this serves her well as an Implementation Coordinator. 

Vincent Tan - Vincent, a recent addition to the Activations team, brings over six years of customer and operations experience. He studied logistics and supply-chain management and has skills in process improvement. He is definitely part of our efforts to continually improve our service as an Implementation Coordinator. 

Contacting Activations 

• 410-266-2299
• ad-activations@collins.com

Thank you for reading; this article rounds out our survey of ARINCDirect support teams. We hope these articles help you understand some of what goes on behind the scenes. Stay tuned for another article about our worldwide support coverage! 

• The very first aircraft activated for ARINCDirect belonged to a customer in the Seattle, Washington area. This customer was so anxious to try a new service provider that he joined us in late 2002, about 6 months BEFORE our actual launch! Every step of that initial activation was brand new to us and completely manual. We have come a long way since then, and we are grateful to this customer for the support (and patience). 

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