The American Customer Satisfaction Index just released its 2023 Travel Study, which ranks airlines, hotels, car rentals, and online travel agencies on customer satisfaction.
For this report, more than 10,500 customers were interviewed via email over the past year and asked to evaluate their recent experiences with a wide variety of travel companies.
Airlines
Alaska Airlines gets the best ranking, rising 8% to an ACSI score of 81 (on a scale of 100).
American and Southwest Airlines each rose 1%, to an ASCI score of 78. United Airlines stayed steady with a 77 score, but scores dipped a bit for Delta Air Lines and Jet Blue.
As you can see from the chart below, airlines, car rental companies, and online travel agencies each made 1% gains in overall customer satisfaction, but satisfaction rose 6% for hotels in general.
JetBlue announced on Tuesday that it will be adding Amsterdam to its list of international flight destinations.
Service will start between New York’s JFK International Airport and Amsterdam Schiphol sometime “late this summer,” according to a JetBlue statement. And flights between Boston Logan and Schiphol are “to follow,” subject to government operating authority.
JetBlue already flies to London’s Heathrow and Gatwick Airports and will begin flying to Paris in June.
As with its other European flights, the daily Amsterdam route will be served by the carrier’s Airbus A321 Long Range (LR) single-aisle aircraft, which has 114 economy seats (“Core”) and 24 new fully lie-flat private suites with sliding doors.
Late Tuesday evening, an essential piece of the aviation transportation network operated by the Federal Aviation Administration failed.
And because of that the FAA temporarily grounded all flights nationwide on Wednesday morning.
The ground stop was lifted by 8:50 am east coast time. But the fallout included more than 1,300 canceled flights and close to 10,500 delayed flights over the course of the day, according to flight-tracking website FlightAware.
And, as we know, when that happens, it can take a few days for flight schedules to fully get back in order.
What went wrong?
The FAA’s Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system, which provides critical safety and operational information to pilots stopped working. And without that information, it wasn’t safe for any planes to take from any airport.
After the reboot, flights resumed. And by Wednesday evening, the FAA issued a statement with some explanation of what went wrong and a reassurance that the agency wasn’t the victim of a cyber-attack. The agency also promises to ‘further pinpoint’ what went wrong, and “prevent this kind of disruption from happening again.”
“The FAA is continuing a thorough review to determine the root cause of the Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system outage. Our preliminary work has traced the outage to a damaged database file. At this time, there is no evidence of a cyber attack. The FAA is working diligently to further pinpoint the causes of this issue and take all needed steps to prevent this kind of disruption from happening again.”
Now What?
Passengers whose flights were canceled are owed refunds by the airlines, even though this was an FAA-induced incident. Most airlines are waiving change fees and allowing ticketed passengers to change plans and trying to rebook passengers on other flights. If your travel plans were disrupted, be sure to see if the credit card you used to book the flight has some sort of travel delay insurance. Here are links to the Travel Alert page for many airlines.
After a week of widespread cancellations and disarray in operations, many Southwest Airlines passengers are still stuck at airports around the country waiting for standby seats. Or in hotels waiting for confirmation of a flight home.
If you’re following social media and watching TV, you’ve also likely seen stories of people renting cars – sometimes with strangers – to get where they need to go.
The airline says it’s doing its best to put things right. And late Wednesday, Southwest Airlines Chief Commercial Officer, Ryan Green, took to social media to offer (more) apologies; a pledge to do “everything we can” to make things up to customers, and something more useful: fresh details about some added tools and resources that might help travelers get refunds, flight reservations, and their baggage.
We’ve let our Customers and Employees down, and we pledge to do everything we can to make it right. If you still need assistance rearranging your travel, getting a refund, or tracking down your luggage, please visit https://t.co/II3YgdPy7J. pic.twitter.com/64Fdt8jJPn
Airports also are beginning to get answers and action from Southwest Airlines. Take a look at this Twitter thread from Chicago’s Midway Airport, where Southwest Airlines is the largest carrier. In addition to trying to accommodate thousands of stranded passengers, the airport has had to store and secure an incredible amount of baggage.
In the meantime, most other airlines are capping fares on many routes to accommodate those who are rebooking themselves on non-Southwest Airlines flights. But since this is still the busy holiday season, those seats are hard to come by too.
For those of you who may be stuck at an airport or know someone whose holiday plans were ruined by weather and airline meltdowns we know you’ll understand the joy this man experienced – and expressed – once he was reunited with this bag at Midway Airport.
After two canceled Southwest flights, Patrick Keane was finally reunited with his bag at Midway, and he let the entire airport know how it felt. @cbschicagopic.twitter.com/aB2vZmRySP
Early Wednesday morning, Flightaware.com was showing almost 2500 Southwest Airlines flights canceled. That leaves thousands of passengers still stuck at airports around the country.
All other domestic airlines now have their schedules back on track since the last weekend’s bad weather. But not Southwest. The airline continues to suffer from staffing problems, software and technology failures, and other challenges.
Southwest Airlines CEO Bob Jordan offered apologies. ( See below). And the airline is offering to cover the costs of hotels, car rentals, and tickets on other airlines in an effort to help out inconvenienced passengers.
If your plans have been ruined, here’s a link to begin filing for that reimbursement. Also be sure to check your credit card for any travel delay benefits it may offer.
The Department of Transportation has vowed to investigate.
But that isn’t really doing much right now to fix the problems and headaches this meltdown has caused. Nor will it make up for ruined holidays and family gatherings, and missed meetings, weddings, funerals, and other important events people were trying to get to.
On the heels of wide-scale disruptions, we're working diligently to Safely recover our operation & accommodate displaced Customers & Crews. We know this is unacceptable & sincerely apologize. If your travel was impacted, explore self-service options here: https://t.co/B6L8HR9Yqcpic.twitter.com/mLWndYMned
Not only are Southwest Airlines passengers still stuck at airports all over the country, baggage is pilling up in bag claims. And many people won’t get flights home until after January 1.
This is the Southwest Airlines baggage claim at @FlyTPA. There’s well over 1,000 bags stacked here. People searching through bag tags here say they haven’t seen their luggage in days @BN9 pic.twitter.com/lvpPeINugZ
Southwest Airlines is the focus of passenger anger after canceling thousands of flights and leaving people stranded. @SecretaryPete joined @JudyWoodruff to discuss how the Department of Transportation will hold Southwest accountable.https://t.co/TArbsnQNEM
