Tuesday, April 11, 2000
Consumer gripes against airlines continue to rise
Figures defy recent new effort to improve service
By Randolph E. Schmid
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Airlines spent a lot of time last year promising things would get better for their customers, but a new study suggests just the opposite occurred: Consumer complaints more than doubled.
“You can see that consumers are just fed up, fed up with poor service,” Brent Bowen of the University of Nebraska at Omaha said in announcing the survey results Monday.
Consumer complaints were up 130 percent from 1998 to 1999, said Dean Headley of Wichita State University. They rose from 1.08 complaints per 100,000 passengers in 1998 to 2.48 last year.
Mr. Headley noted that improved Internet access made it easier to file complaints, but said that could not account for such a large increase.
Decline across board
The annual report, based on data collected by the Department of Transportation, scores the air carriers on on-time performance, baggage handling, consumer complaints and denied boardings.
It found an overall decline in airline quality last year, with only baggage handling showing a slight improvement.
The airlines instituted a consumer bill of rights in December, after a year of pressure from Congress to improve service. A report to Congress by the General Accounting Office on how they are doing is scheduled for June.
Diana Cronan of the Air Transport Association, which represents the major airlines, noted that the airlines' voluntary “customer first” plan was not put into effect until the end of the year.
“We really would like to see the results next year when the plan has been in place for a full year. We really do believe that things will be better,” she said.
Delta ranks third
Southwest Airlines ranked best overall, as it did in 1997. Last year, the top spot went to USAirways, which fell to No. 6 this year.
This year, Continental finished second, followed by Delta, Northwest and Alaska Airlines. American was No. 7, followed by America West, TWA and United.
Atlanta-based Delta operates its second-biggest hub at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.
Delta spokeswoman Alesia Watson said the problems reflected in the survey were those that prompted the major airlines to start the program to improve service.
“We know there were issues in the summertime last year, and that's why we started the program,” she said. “We are improving.”
The report's only good news involved baggage handling. The study found that the industry mishandled 5.08 bags per 1,000 passengers in 1999, down from 5.16 per 1,000 a year earlier.
On the other hand, there was a drop in the portion of flights that arrived within 15 minutes of schedule. On-time performance slipped from 77.2 percent to 76.1 percent, and denied boardings was virtually stable, edging from 0.87 per 10,000 passengers to 0.88.
The study was particularly critical of airlines for instituting what they called a series of anti-consumer rules designed to increase productivity.
These include tighter limits on carry-on bags, bans on carry-on food, not allowing a consumer to take an earlier connection when a seat is available and raising fees to change tickets.
“Soon, consumers will become driven by price and schedule only and regard airline loyalty as having no tangible value,” the authors concluded.
Supporting data
The Department of Transportation, which independently reports on airline performance, found similar problems through February.
Consumers registered 1,999 complaints about the 10 largest carriers in February, slightly down from January but nearly double a year earlier.
It found that 74.8 percent of flights arrived on time in February — also slightly better than in January but not as good as 78.9 percent in February 1999.
Mr. Headley acknowledged the new passenger bill of rights instituted by airlines and said change does take time. But he said the steps promised by the airlines were things they should have been doing already.
Enquirer reporter Cliff Peale contributed to this report.
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