Rising fares and increasing fees could be reasons for growing customer unrest.
Between January and March this year, the nation’s largest airlines posted their best on-time arrival rate for the first quarter of any year since the Department of Transportation began collecting comparable flight delay data in 1995. Supporters cite this as a clear example of the effectiveness of government regulation back by stiff fines.
The 15 carriers reporting on-time performance posted an on-time arrival rate of 84% during the first quarter of 2012. The previous first-quarter record was the 81.3% on-time arrival mark set during January-March 2002. The carriers also recorded an on-time arrival rate of 82.2% in March, an improvement over March 2011’s on-time rate of 79.2%, but down from February 2012’s 86.2%. The airlines with the lowest on-time records are ExpressJet Airlines at 74.1%; Virgin America at 74.9%; and United Airlines at 77.4%.
Airlines reported three tarmac delays of more than three hours on domestic flights and no tarmac delays of more than four hours on international flights in March. All of the long domestic tarmac delays took place on March 17 in St. Louis, a day when severe thunderstorms disrupted service.
In March, the Department received 1,117 complaints about airline service from consumers, up 39.1% from the 803 complaints received in March 2011 and up 61.6% from the 691 complaints filed in February 2012. Of that total, 213 of the March complaints were about charter operator Direct Air ceasing operations. For the first quarter of this year, the Department received 2,743 complaints, up 16.8% from the 2,348 filed during the first quarter of 2011.
It is a clear example of the effectiveness and the need for government regulation of industry since airline passengers were not treated fairly or getting reliable transportation until DOT put in place regulations with stiff fines to stop all too common abuses.
The larger U.S. airlines have been required to report long tarmac delays on their domestic flights since October 2008. Under a new rule that took effect in August of 2011, all U.S. and foreign airlines operating at least one aircraft with 30 or more passenger seats must report lengthy tarmac delays at U.S. airports.
Also beginning last August, carriers operating international flights may not allow tarmac delays at U.S. airports to last longer than four hours. There is a separate three-hour limit on tarmac delays involving domestic flights, which went into effect in April 2010.
See also:
- Tougher DOT Airline Regulations Take Effect This Week
- FAA Finally Alters Pilot Fatigue Rules after Colgan Air Deaths
- American Airlines Files for Bankruptcy – Pensions Threatened?
- American Fined $900,000 for Tarmac Delays at O’Hare Airport
- Biofuels Now in Commercial Use at United and Alaska Airlines
- DOT Fines Orbitz for Violating Price Advertising Rules
- Auto Industry Reputation Shows Big Gains as Airlines Crash
- House and Senate Finally Agree Not to Close FAA but Fail to Address Taxes for Aviation and Bankrupt Highway Trust Fund
- EPA Tightens Airplane Emissions Rules as U.S. Carriers Sue EU
- DOT adds Protections for Air Travelers Abused by Airlines
- Atlanta Airport TSA Employee Handcuffs, Rapes Woman
