Air New Zealand is to use wearable wristbands to track unaccompanied children travelling on single- and multi-sector flights.

The airline has been trialling the innovative IoT application in recent months and said it would continue to offer the service for free until February 2016.

It is available on both domestic and international routes.

The band contains a chip that is scanned “at key stages of the journey to trigger text notifications to up to five nominated contacts”.

“We believe this is the first time this type of technology has been used by an airline anywhere in the world for the purpose of providing caregivers greater peace of mind when their child is travelling alone,” Air New Zealand’s customer experience general manager Carrie Hurihanganui said.