Airline quality improved in 2009
Travelers had a better overall experience on airlines in 2009, according to the annual Airline Quality Report.
Airlines improved in three of the four categories used to determine the rankings.
Dean Headley, associate professor of marketing at Wichita State University, will present the report and overall airline scores in Washington, D.C. Monday.
He will be joined by Paul Bowen, a former professor at WSU who is now the head of the aviation technology department at Purdue University.
The AQR uses information the airlines report to the U.S. Department of Transportation regarding on-time performance, involuntary denied boardings, mishandled bags and customer complaints to determine an overall score for the industry and individual airlines.
The industry scored better compared to 2008 in on-time performance, mishandled bags and customer complaints. It scored worse in 2009 on involuntary denied boardings.
Hawaiian Airlines had the best on-time performance, 92.1 percent, in 2009. Atlantic Southeast Airlines had the worst at 71.2 percent.
Fourteen airlines improved on-time performance in 2009, but only six of the 18 rated had on-time percentages higher than 80 percent.
American Eagle had the highest rate of involuntary denied boardings at 3.76 per 10,000 passengers.
Jet Blue was perfect in that category, scoring no involuntary denied boardings.
AirTran Airways had the best baggage handling rate at 1.67 mishandled bags per 1,000 passengers. Atlantic Southeast scored the worst at 7.87 mishandled bags per 1,000 passengers.
However, all 18 of the airlines rated improved their baggage handling scores in 2009.
Southwest Airlines had the rate of customer complaints at 0.21 percent per 100,000 passengers. Delta Air Lines had the highest rate at 1.96 customer complaints per 100,000 passengers.