Planes are getting more crowded, security's a nightmare, ticket prices are rising. Perhaps it's no surprise that customer satisfaction ratings for 15 of 16 airlines fell in 2005, as measured by the 16th annual Airline Quality Rating.
The best performing airlines continue to be low-fare carriers. Following Jet Blue in the top five of the AQR were AirTran, the now-defunct Independence Air, Southwest and United.
The overall airline industry performed more poorly in 2005, due largely to a significant increase in mishandled bags. Customer complaints in the airline industry were 17 percent higher in 2005 than 2004.
The AQR is a summary of month-by-month quality ratings for the largest domestic U.S. airlines operating during 2005. Co-researchers Brent Bowen, director and professor, University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) Aviation Institute/School of Public Administration, and Dean Headley, associate professor of marketing at Wichita State University (WSU), used 15 elements important to consumers when judging the quality of airline service.
The rating is conducted annually by the UNO Aviation Institute and W. Frank Barton School of Business at WSU. The AQR, as an industry standard, provides consumers and industry watchers a means to compare quality among airlines using objective performance-based data. It is a cooperative research project funded as part of faculty research activities at UNO and WSU.
The AQR ranked the 17 largest airlines for 2005:
1) Jet Blue;
2) AirTran;
3) Independence Air;
4) Southwest;
5) United;
6) America West;
7) Northwest;
8) Continental;
9) Alaska;
10) American;
11) ATA;
12) Delta;
13) SkyWest;
14) American Eagle;
15) US Airways;
16) Comair; and
17) Atlantic Southeast.
"At a time when the airlines got worse, they all kind of got worse at the same rate," said Headley. "For the most part, the airlines maintained their position in the rating. Only two airlines changed noticeably in the rating; Alaska dropped from No. 5 to 9, and US Air dropped from No. 12 to 15.
"Every airline performed more poorly in baggage handling," he said. "The big question is, why."
Bowen said that the entire industry must be concerned that this years AQR score is the lowest in five years. "If we continue down this path, consumers will lose all confidence in the airlines' capability to perform," said Bowen.
Criteria included in the AQR are screened to meet two basic elements: They must be readily obtainable from published data sources for each airline, and they must be important to consumers regarding airline quality. The resulting criteria include areas such as baggage handling, customer complaints, denied boardings and on-time arrivals.
Other major industry findings in this years research study include:
• Industry performance in each of the four AQR criteria was worse in 2005 compared to 2004. The criteria are on-time performance, denied boardings, mishandled baggage and consumer complaints.
• Only five of 17 airlines had an on-time percentage of more than 80 percent.
• SkyWest had the best on-time performance for 2005; Jet Blue had the lowest denied boarding rate; AirTran had the best baggage handling rate; and Southwest Airlines had the lowest consumer complaint rate.
• The only airline to show improvement in its AQR score in 2005 was Comair, although the airline finished second-to-last in the overall rating.
• Seven airlines improved their on-time arrival performance in 2005.
• The customer complaint rate was higher for 14 of the 16 airlines rated in 2004 and 2005.
