Upvote:-1
Nobody ever wants to see or know your ticket number, e-ticket or paper ticket.
You need to have bought a ticket, obviously, or you can't fly, so you implicitly have to have a ticket number. But you only ever need it when you want to retroactively add the miles to your frequent flyer account.
Upvote:2
With e-tickets, the ticket itself is a record in an airline database.
In my experience at manned check-in desks you just hand over your passport and the airline finds your e-ticket and checks you in.
On the other hand at unmanned kiosks the system generally does ask you for ticket details to confirm who you are. Presumably because the automated kiosks are less able to check the security features of a passport than a manual check-in.