Love for the team to comment on the airline ranking news out June, 20

MaryKatesMom

DIS Veteran
Joined
Feb 20, 2003
http://www.airlinequality.com/news/qatar-airways-is-voted-the-worlds-best-airline-in-2017/

The highest American Carrier was Delta at number 32. I know that is Pete's favorite airline.

My opinion is the airline industry has a better lobby than the consumers. There are too many mergers and no competition.

There is a Russian Roulette to buying a ticket on a legacy carrier. One day a flight may have a new nice plane, plenty of legroom, comfy seats and decent entertainment. The next day, same flight and same airline - old plane, small thin seats and crappy entertainment. If the airlines had to distinguish themselves with consistent quality then maybe we would have a fighting chance.

At least SW is consistent.

From USA Today
https://www.usatoday.com/story/trav...lines-skytrax-world-airline-awards/411428001/

From CNN
http://www.cnn.com/travel/article/airlines-lessons-foreign-carriers/index.html
 
I'm always skeptical about stories like this one because there is no way to really understand the demographics of the people who voted. Without that its really hard to know how their experiences mesh with mine. For example, if airline X is primarily a long-haul carrier I would expect a different level of service/comfort than airline Y which just does 2-3 hour flights.

Having said that, I fly Delta very frequently. My experience is that they really don't change plane types that often. Its just that they open their schedule 11 months out so there is more time during which they might change. For a given aircraft type, I find their service and seats very consistent.
 
Like many consumers products, this stuff is so subjective. I have not personally flown Delta, but so many of the people I know who have HATED it for various reasons. I love Southwest, but a lot of people hate that you can't reserve seats. It's all a matter of opinion.
 
There are 19.87 million survey entries with 41 different factors measured. Sounds like more than a handful of peoples opinions.

There are 10 different categories from "Best Overall" to "Best Low-Cost" to "Best First Class" to "Best Regional".

"19.87 million eligible survey entries were counted in the final results, and 105 nationalities participated in the survey from August 2016 to May 2017. The survey covered over 325 airlines, from largest international airlines to smaller domestic carriers, measuring Quality standards for 41 KPI’s across front-line product and service factors in the Airport and Onboard environments. "
 


A lot of American consumers simply never leave the continental US and thus never experience just how bad they've got it when it comes to commercial air carriers. I literally laugh out loud at my British friends who complain long and loud about British Air, when in my experience even on one of their epic bad days, BA still kicks every single American carriers butt in pretty much every single category. It's comical how badly the US consumer has been treated by their domestic carriers ... yet we still line up to take our lumps.

I've flown Qatar Airlines a couple of times. They are just brilliant in all respects. No qualms at all with them being rated number one.
 
A lot of American consumers simply never leave the continental US and thus never experience just how bad they've got it when it comes to commercial air carriers. I literally laugh out loud at my British friends who complain long and loud about British Air, when in my experience even on one of their epic bad days, BA still kicks every single American carriers butt in pretty much every single category. It's comical how badly the US consumer has been treated by their domestic carriers ... yet we still line up to take our lumps.

I've flown Qatar Airlines a couple of times. They are just brilliant in all respects. No qualms at all with them being rated number one.

This was my feelings exactly! We don't know how bad we have it!
 
A lot of American consumers simply never leave the continental US and thus never experience just how bad they've got it when it comes to commercial air carriers. I literally laugh out loud at my British friends who complain long and loud about British Air, when in my experience even on one of their epic bad days, BA still kicks every single American carriers butt in pretty much every single category. It's comical how badly the US consumer has been treated by their domestic carriers ... yet we still line up to take our lumps.

I've flown Qatar Airlines a couple of times. They are just brilliant in all respects. No qualms at all with them being rated number one.

Agree completely!! North American Airlines "bank" on the fact that most will never experience other international airlines. If they all stay basically the same level of bad they seem to be content with that!
 


Like many consumers products, this stuff is so subjective. I have not personally flown Delta, but so many of the people I know who have HATED it for various reasons. I love Southwest, but a lot of people hate that you can't reserve seats. It's all a matter of opinion.
In recent years SWA is the primary airline we fly but we have flown Delta twice in the last just over 4 years.

There are drawbacks to how both are but I still prefer SWA. I will say SWA recently announced they are planning on going to Hawaii...great we just went there this past September and had to fly Delta when we really wished SWA would have flown there.

Having said that though the in-flight entertainment on Delta with the screens on the backs of the seats was awesome for that longer flight and the outlet for charging cables was very important for that long flight too. But I really didn't enjoy the boarding process. WAYYYYYYYY too many people were boarding prior to Zone 1 (where my husband boarded with the Amex Delta Skymiles CC) and especially when Zone 2 came around (where I boarded because we were using reward miles for me). The amount of abuse on pre-board was quite astounding. So yeah sure I had an assigned seat but it doesn't alleviate anxiety over boarding and cabin bin space. Also Delta changes their flight times. We booked and we had minimal changes on nearly all our flights (I think the most was 10mins difference)-plus 1 flight they actually moved us (though we were still in the same 2-seat part just different row number) because of an aircraft change about a week before our flight-talk about stress you book your seat and that can change. I've seen people report their flight was changed forwards or backwards by something like 5 hrs!

I love SWA but if flying for Hawaii.....I feel like they need to step up that part. I don't care so much on the other flights but flying from KC to LAX to HNL in-flight entertainment would be great and charging abilities really important.

So really pros and cons to them both.
 
I do agree on service aspect when regarding the survey's metrics in regards to domestic and international. It's clear that many international carriers have quite the digs when it comes to airplanes and different customer service experiences.

I do wonder the safety ratings of the airlines on each of their lists they had in the article. IDK I just would find that interesting to know if there is any correlation between what people love so much and what the safety ratings are.
 

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