The Department of Transportation released its monthly Air Travel Consumer Report (PDF) Friday, giving us on-time, mishandled baggage and consumer complaint data for September. There have been several news reports on the high-level glamor stuff, but what about the parts of the iceberg under the water?
On-time performance is actually becoming on-time.
I spent so much time last month dissecting New York airspace and all of its woes that for a change of pace, I’m going to talk about some good news.
Don’t fall out of your chair.
The airline industry’s rate of on-time arrival improved 6.5 percentage points between August and September 2008, and as of the date of the DOT’s report, was just shy of 85 percent. Not too bad, considering all the bad cocktail party banter and Capitol Hill puffery about how unpleasant it is to fly these days.
Underneath that improvement are some bona fide individual successes:
-Considering that a recent article of mine had a whole section devoted to how poorly jetBlue was performing operationally, I was surprised to see their on-time rate improve by 16.1 percentage points to 80.8 percent.
-American improved by 10.9 points to 81.5 percent on-time.
-AirTran bested its August arrival rate by 10.2 points, improving to 88.5 percent.
-Comair, while still the latest of the lot, improved by 10 percentage points to 77.4 percent.
-US Airways seems to be staying in its operational groove, and on a twelve-month rolling average, is within less than one percentage point of perennial champ Southwest. Not bad, Tempe, especially considering the operational challenges presented by your unresolved labor negotiations with your pilots.
In August, there were 74 flights throughout the airline industry that arrived late more than 80 percent of the time. In September, that number was down to two. Yes, you read that correctly. Two. And neither one of them involves travel to, from or anywhere near New York City. They were American’s 1267 from Miami to San Juan and Delta Connection/Comair’s 6,273 from Cleveland to Atlanta.
Less baggage is being lost (but less people are checking bags).
The number of mishandled baggage reports, and the rate at which they were filed, continues to decline. Between September 2007 and September 2008, the number of lost luggage claims for the industry dropped 35 percent. That’s the stuff of an airline spin doctor’s dream.
Not so fast.
Airline industry enplanements are down 19 percent for the same time period. What’s more, all of those dreaded fees for checking luggage have driven more of us to carry-ons or to simply pack lighter.
I’ve been in the airline business for two decades, so I know better than to check a bag. Now that it costs money, it seems many of you are joining the ranks of sensible packers and you’re leaving your steamer trunks at home.
In all seriousness, the baggage loss rate is improving, but there is still one spot that remains a problem: commuter airlines. The six airlines on the September report with the worst loss rates are all commuter airlines that feed majors. Look back in time, and that trend is consistent. The handoff from the “mainline” operation to the “commuter” operation is always a sticking point. The airplanes may be painted with the same logo, but you might as well be changing planes between totally unrelated airlines, like going from Aeroflot to Zambian Airways.
At least their service is consistent … consistently bad, that is.
I’m running out of things to say about US Airways’ complaint rate. I’ve called myself a “broken record.” I’ve referred to US Airways as “beleaguered.” I’ve pointed out the fact that US Airways had “more customer service complaints than any other airline.” I’ve sung the song “Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, think I’ll go eat worms.” I’ve even asked readers for help explaining this phenomenon. You all have been of no help thus far, and I’m still open to your suggestions, because I suspect I’ll be back in this writer’s block conundrum again next month.
So here I go again: US Airways is in last place. And it was in last place in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. Wait a minute. Sorry. I misspoke. 2006 was a tie for last place. There have been a few glimmers of hope this year; a few times USAir was almost in last place.
How many times can a person use the words “last place” in one paragraph?
I’ll be back next month to see what else I can find for you. Hopefully, for our sake, the on-time trend will continue at least through the holiday rush.
